For Want of a Seed
by Nytewing
Summary: A plant grows, a plant dies, Aziraphale takes a wrong turn, and a few truths are revealed. (aka: post-Apocalypse Crowley finally deals with the issues he's been ignoring for the last 6000 years while also attempting to grow a plant) Aziraphale/Crowley. additional tags: soft, healing, hand-holding for both dramatic and tender reasons, extended metaphors about astronomy and knitting.
1. Part 1: A Mote of Dust and a Name

A/N: This fic is cross-posted over at Ao3 (same title). The footnotes are linked/hovertexted over there, so if scrolling bothers you please read there 3 (also, if you're impatient, the story is complete there. I'm going to be updating it every other day or so here)

**Chapter 1: A Mote of Dust and a Name**

Our tale begins, as all tales ultimately must, with a seed. This seed, currently sitting in a small linen sachet was quite unaware of the storied lineage to which it is an heir. If it had known, perhaps the events which unfolded on the night of November the 2nd two thousand and nineteen[1] would have gone rather differently. I will sum up these events here for you, but please bear in mind that the titular seed has no knowledge of them.

The Garden of Eden had existed for nearly two entire days and its current population numbered five; the demon Crawly and the angels Aziraphale (Guardian of the Eastern Gate), Cahethal (Warden of the Western Fields), Soqedhozi (Guardian of the North Shore), and Kutiel (who refused a title, but tended to linger around the Southern River). Crawly had spent much of the time since being ordered to the Garden avoiding the aforementioned angels, who he was sure knew he was there but who did not deign to search for a single lowly serpent.

In his quest to avoid being stepped on or impaled upon the great flaming sword he had seen the blond angel fiddling with that morning, Crawly was slithering around the base of towering Wall searching for a sunny spot to warm himself. The sun was new and Crawly could happily say it was his favorite feature of this new Universe the Above was playing around with. He raised his head and scented the air, there, just ahead there was some of that undefinable something that promised the best nap of his relatively short life. He slid through a patch of flowering moss, grey-green tendrils parting beneath the coal of his scales. He quite liked the little yellow flowers the moss was bravely trying to grow. It was a little against his mandate to 'get up there and cause some trouble' but he sent a small miracle into the patch of moss to ensure it was not out-competed by the larger plants surrounding it[2] and continued on his way. Through some lovely little ferns, over the root of a tall tree, the first to produce a pinecone if his guess was right, and finally to the spot he had smelled.

It was, of course, perfect. This was Eden after all. But in Crawly's estimation it was more perfect than even the rest of the garden was managing just then. Surrounded on three sides by tree roots and on the fourth by a wall of swaying grasses, the branches above opened up just enough to allow a single shaft of sunlight to reach and warm the flat bit of shale at the very center. Small particles of dust glinted in the beam of light and Crawly's mouth curled into an expression that should be quite impossible given his anatomy. A speck of dust in a sunbeam. Crawly had spent the last while of his time as an angel helping the Lightbringer hand the stars and shaping the nebulae. He had quite liked that bit of being a part of the Above, even if the rest had left a great deal to be desired (once he had figured out what _desire_ was).

After lifting his head from the soil to check for Angels and finding himself alone, Crawly slithered into the sunbeam. He curled himself into a ball, resting his head on one of his coils, and _basked. _Heaven and Hell could rot for all he cared if it meant he was free to enjoy feelings like this on Earth[3].

How does this moment of peace relate to the little seed in the sachet, you might be wondering?

Crawly was awoken from his nap by a woman's finger gently running across the top of his head. He blinked his way to consciousness, unaware that he had slept away two entire days (nearly a full third of the time the planet had existed, it was a very good nap). The woman smiled down at him and spoke in the language of the Angels, her vowels blurred and her consonants clipped in a way no angel's tongue could manage.

"Hello there, little one." Crawly did not speak. She shifted and laid down, her gentle curves pressing the grasses flat on either side of her. When her eyes were level with Crawly's she spoke again, "My husband, Adam, is meant to be naming all the beasts of the land, sea, and air. But, we have not seen anything quite like you yet so I do not know what to call you."

Crawly tightened his coils just a bit, aware in some deep part of his being that this was a very important moment in the history of Creation.

"If I were to name you," she whispered, "Do you think you might keep it a secret from Adam? He is very good at naming things, but," here she glanced away from him to the shale. Her blunt nails scraped little lines into the stone, "But, I feel a little as if I am not yet real." A little smile curled her lips. "It sounds so silly when I say it aloud, but it is true. Adam even named me. Oh, I did not introduce myself. Hello, little one, my name is Eve, wife of Adam." She reached out one finger towards him. Unsure of what she wanted, Crawly extended the tip of his tail and touched it to her finger. She waggled it up and down a few times.

"There, that was more proper. So," she beamed at him, "may I name you? It seems only fair to have permission first, it is your life after all."

Ever so slowly, Crawly nodded his head.

"Oh, thank you!" Eve said. She looked at him for long enough for him to begin to shift uncomfortably. No one had looked at him so kindly for so long since he Fell. "I think I will call you a 'snake'. Is that an alright name?"

Crawly considered the name. He had never heard it before, but it fit in the same way an updraft fit his wings or the sun fit his scales. He nodded again.

"Good," she tapped the top of his head with her finger again. "I should be getting back, but I will make sure that 'snake' is what my dear husband comes up with when it is time to name you all proper."

She stood and left, and a deep sadness swept over Crawly. Here was the magnificent woman, the first of her kind in all of Creation, who was clever and kind and had only wanted to take some agency in the world around her and she would still need to ask permission from the man for whom she had been made to serve to actualize that agency. He shivered a little, despite the perfect sunbeam still falling upon him. He did not mean to Fall, but he could not regret it when faced with the lack of _choice _the Above forced upon those over which it ruled.

Suddenly feeling as if he could not take another moment in the sun, he uncurled himself and crept towards the wall.

And there it was. Just at the edge of the little slab of shale was a single seed. The first to ever form and fall from a plant. He glanced around and closed his eyes, casting his awareness about for prying eyes. Upon finding none, he swiftly shifted from snake (oh he really did like the sound of that) to demon. Then, he picked up the seed pod, slipped it into a fold of his robes, and stepped out of the light entirely.

* * *

**Footnotes:**  
[1] Propriety would have me say 'in the year of our Lord' somewhere about here, but 2019 happens to be the same year in which the Good Lord planned to end the world entirely, so she will forgive me if I say propriety be damned.

[2] After Adam and Eve were cast out, Crowley was obliged to leave Eden, lest he be found by Angels less gregarious than Aziraphale. He never returned, but if he had, he would have found this same patch of moss still thriving, star-shaped yellow flowers open to catch the sun, in the middle of what would had become one of the most arid places on Earth.

[3] Later, nearly 6000 years later in fact, he would identify this as the first time he had thought of himself as being on the side of the Middle rather than the Above or the Below.

* * *

**Biblical (and non-biblical but still religious) references:** Please, if I got any of this wrong, assume I did that on purpose and its artistic license and not (as would be the truth) my many years of skipping Sunday school or any other church service showing.

Cahethal – the angel of agriculture, in the Book of Adam and Eve (not considered 'canon' by any modern religion as far as I'm aware, but supposedly depicting the days after Adam and Eve were cast from the garden) they take their first meal from the food that grows to the west.

Soqedhozi – the angel of balances, who weighs deeds against each other (the sea to the north of Eden was said to be able to cleanse humans of their sins, so I thought that might be interpreted as 'wiping the slate clean' as it were and be in the domain of balance).

Kutiel – angel who governs water and the use of divining rods. Adam and Eve did not need to drink until they left the garden and took their first necessary sips of water from the southern river, divining rods are used to find water when none is visible.


	2. If At First, At First, At First, At Fir-

A/N: I've tried to include enough clues throughout this chapter that you could figure out what the plant is that Crowley is trying to grow... so uh, I'd love to hear folks guesses!

**Chapter 2: If At First, At First, At First**

The First Seed would not have the opportunity to fulfill its purpose until nearly three thousand years later when the Demon bought a small clay pot from a street vendor in Memphis[1]. The pot was perhaps as wide as Crowley palm and formed from the red clay of the Nile. It had an etching of a snake in white around the rim and he quite liked that detail. He paid three times the seller's asking price and then mentioned to the next merchant he passed that his neighbor had just come into some money. After purchasing the pot, he popped over to the Nile's river delta and scooped up what looked like good soil. He knew nothing of plants, but the humans were always scrabbling to see who could control the most river-front acreage, so he thought there must be something to all that.

He planted the seed. It was not a dignified moment; all that happened was he Miracled a little water into the pot, dug around his robes for the seed, and shoved it into the dirt with little ceremony.

Then, he waited.

He nearly forgot about the seed for a few days. He had tucked it once more into the folds of his robes, ensuring that the edge of the pot just poked up so sunlight could reach the soil, and did not think about it again until three days later when he went to sit down and nearly broke it. Carefully, he withdrew the delicate container and leaned down to inspect it.

In the very center of the dark soil, which he guiltily realized he had forgotten to water entirely, was the tiniest peek of green. A feeling he had not experienced since Eve walked away from him in the Garden swept through his gut.

He grew this. It was tiny, sure, but it was his. Moreover, it was a piece of Eden and it was living in his pocket. He had never quite understood how the Angels could get together for impromptu choral numbers[2] but suddenly he felt like he could sing.

"Good job," he whispered to the sprout, "You've got this, little one."

Privately, he promised to take better care of it. Not another day would pass without the little plant receiving water or some uninterrupted time in the sun.

The plant grew inches every day, seeming to soak up the sunshine, turning it into rapid growth.

Then, while Crowley was in outer Mongolia fanning the fires of jealousy between two brothers who loved the same woman (who happened to love neither of them, but that was her business, not Crowley's), the plant died.

Try as he might, Crowley could come up with no reason why the plant should have failed to keep growing as spectacularly as it had been. He watered it every day, gave it adequate sun time, Miracled a bubble of warmth around it even as the cool nights on the Steppe descended. No matter what he did, the plant grew more shriveled and rotten each day, until finally, he had to admit that he had failed.

It tore at him. The First Seed, something so deeply holy that they probably never should have been allowed to exist on the same planet, and he killed it. Eden was long gone, that little sunspot where he had been named by Eve lost to everyone and living on only in his memory. Only now, after he had failed, did he realize how very badly he had wanted to carry a little piece of the Garden with him.

In frustration, he ripped the dead roots from the soil and tossed them to the Earth. Then, immediately overcome with guilt, he stooped to touch the remains of the plant.

What he saw then will make little sense to those among you with knowledge of how plants work, but fatefully, Crowley had no such knowledge. At the center of the still far from fully grown plant was a single seed[3] Crowley snatched it up, feeling as if he couldn't have gone too wrong in his methods if the plant made another seed.

He had lost too much of the dirt from the Nile delta to replant the new seed in it. So, he made due with what was around him and refilled the little pot. Then he took the seed in hand.

"You are going to grow," he told it. His voice was far gentler than most would say a demon's voice could be. He was not being completely forthright, if he had been, what he actually would have said was, "I need you to grow."

And grow it did. For a few weeks. Then it seemed to rot from the inside.

He took the seed.

Planted it.

Started over.

This time he discovered maggots eating away at the roots. He carefully scraped them away and tried again.

Planted. Watched. Failed.

Started again.

* * *

**1347 | Rome, Italy | 672 Years Before it All Comes Crashing Down**

It is a common misconception that divine (or demonic as the case may be) entities universally have the gift of foresight. One does, the archangel Zaphkiel is the holder of all knowledge but she's not keen on sharing that knowledge[4]. The rest of the heavily host and the entirety of the forces of evil are left to find out what happens as it happens. It is for this reason that neither Crowley or Aziraphale knew to avoid Italy in the Spring of 1347.

Crowley was enjoying tempting the clergymen of Rome and creating a new mental map of the consecrated ground in the city (it felt like soon the humans were going to make the whole of Italy Holy). When not busy with his work, he spent hours at a time people watching from the balcony of the luxurious rooms he was scamming from a corrupt nobleman. The plant was set on the edge of the balcony where it might receive a full compliment of afternoon sunshine. From what he could tell the angel was doing much the same as himself only in the opposite direction. It was a peaceful sort of arrangement, with them both in the same city alternately doing and undoing each others deeds. They met a few times over wine and Crowley found himself laughing and enjoying the company of an angel in a way he had never thought to again. They had encountered each other many times over the centuries, but this was the first time they had ever spent any length of time in close proximity.

One evening, a few weeks after Crowley started noticing people growing sick around him, he quite literally bumped into the angel. He was trotting down the street, looking back over his shoulder and laughing as a fish monger shouted after him for getting the neighborhood cats addicted to fresh fish and then he was sprawled across the ground.

"Oh, I am sorry about that," the person he had run into said.

Crawley threw his head back against the ground and laughed again. Of course it was the Angel.

"Hello," he said. Aziraphale had regained his feet and he peered down at Crowley.

"Crawly!" He blushed, "I do apologize, habit you know[5]. It's quite lovely to see you again Crowley. What's this twice in one week?"

He reached down and offered Crowley a hand. Crowley took it without hesitation and soon found himself being levered to his feet. He paused to brush off his leggings.

"Fault's entirely my own," he muttered.

"Yes, where were you going in such a hurry?"

"Oh, away," Crowley said as airily as he could manage. It wasn't quite that he thought Aziraphale would disapprove, in fact he seemed like the type to appreciate a temptation if it was in the favor of some hungry cats. But, there was an instinct deep in Crowley's gut that said to never reveal anything to someone's whose Grace was intact.

Aziraphale favored him with a particularly dry look. "I'm sure." Crowley grinned at him.

"The last time we were both free in Rome You tempted me, may I return the favor?" Aziraphale looked intrigued so he continued, "There's a nice new place near the colosseum and the owner hasn't even died of plague yet."

Aziraphale sent him a baleful look. He shrugged. It was true after all. The city was being ravaged by the most recent outbreak of the plague (he'd spent an entire afternoon searching for Pestilence to completely avoid him).

They started walking towards the old center of the city in comfortable silence. Then, as they were passing the door to a small chapel Aziraphale gasped.

"You wouldn't." He stopped walking.

"I wouldn't what?" Crowley allowed a sinful smile to cross his face, "You'll find I have very few limits."

"Do this," Aziraphale was practically snarling as he gestured to the sick man Crowley could just see inside the gate of the chapel's garden. It was a singularly disconcerting gesture from the normally placid angel.

Crowley took a step back. He held up his hands. "Disease is not my favored arrow," he drawled. He could see Aziraphale becoming more worked up by the moment, but couldn't seem to stop himself from responding flippantly.

Aziraphale's wings were casting shadows now, for all that they had not yet physically manifested. There was a holy light beginning to stream from the angel. It burned Crowley's skin where he was uncovered in deference to the hot afternoon.

"Azira-" He was cut off by the gasp from the Priest in the gate.

"Demon!" The man shouted. "Foul unholy beast! You have brought disease upon us!" Crowley turned to protest, only to see that the man was clearly pointing at Aziraphale. Which would be hilarious, were it not for the fact that the man was brandishing a knife.

Crowley sighed. "Angel, I did not cause this plague and I would suggest you leave. I'll deal with this."

Aziraphale's holy glow lessened ever so slightly. He was still casting angelic shadows, but his fury had subsided as rapidly as it arose. "I am, oh dear, I am sorry." He wrung his hands as he started to back away, "I know you wouldn't. It's just been a long few days."

Crowley waved one hand dismissively. He really shouldn't have expected any differently. Of course the angel would assume he was the root cause of the disease. It was just, well he had hoped that Aziraphale had noticed that his temptations of late were primarily geared towards helping people bleed away the tension that built up when people feared for their lives.

He did not say any of that however. All he said was, "It's fine. Go."

Aziraphale vanished.

Crowley planned to wait a few seconds before turning to the man and telling to all about how Heaven was looking out for them in these trying times (he could already taste the foul aftertaste he words were going to leave in his mouth). But, when he turned back to the man he found he had suddenly approached much closer and then he found that his stomach really hurt. He looked down to see that the man, the priest, had stabbed him with what was surely a blessed blade.

"What the fuck, mate?" He asked. "I made the demon go away!"

"Liar! You're clearly in league with it!" The Priest hissed, "I will cleanse Rome of your evil!"

Oh, he was one of those. Crowley rolled his eyes and snapped his fingers, attempting to freeze time. Nothing happened. He snapped again. Nothing. He looked at his hand and shook it a few times for good measure and tried again. Nothing.

When he looked back up the Priest had been joined by three others, all of whom were surrounding him. He sighed. The ache in his belly was spreading. The dreadful taint of a powerful blessing eating into the very core of this corporation. He had no idea why he had just done that. Here was his chance to be free of angelic interference for at least a few years and what had he done? Ensured his own swift trip back Below.

Stupid.

The priests were still surrounding him but it was all beginning to fade a bit. Once of the younger ones approached him, a crucifix held before him. Crowley hissed. The man flinched back violently.

Fuck this.

Crowley snapped his fingers. It took a few tries because they were slick with blood (when had that happened?), but soon enough there was a satisfying _snap _and the whoosh of hellfire. Teleportation might be off the table, but fire was always at hand. They wanted to blame him for the Plague currently sweeping their city? Fine. He'd give them something to blame him for.

Their panic gave him the chance he needed to stroll away. His rooms were quite close and suddenly all he wanted was to sit on his balcony for a few minutes before going to sleep. When he turned the corner it was to find Aziraphale waiting and pacing.

"I'm sorry!" It burst from the angel, seemingly without his permission. "I don't really think you caused all this. Oh, dear and now you're bleeding. Here let me-" He reached out a glowing hand. Crowley snarled and slapped it away. Holy healing burned at the best of times, just then he did not think he could handle the way it would sweep through him, leaving nothing unscorched or unholy.

"I'll be fine," he lied. "I just need to nap for a bit." Without meaning to, he reached out and pat Aziraphale's shoulder. "Rain check on the dinner, yeah?"

"Of course." Aziraphale straightened his tunic. "Please look me up as soon as you are able."

Crowley nodded faintly. He could see the build he let rooms in just ahead.

"Goodbye, angel," he muttered.

He entered his rooms on the last legs of his energy. The balcony was secluded and he had warded the entire thing for privacy, so he drug himself across the space and collapsed onto the luxurious chair in the center of the space.

He could just see his plant, new shoots finally poking through the soil. It had taken a long time to sprout this time.

His last thought as he faded away was that he hoped someone would water it. Maybe without him around it would have a better chance of growing.

And then he was gone. Or at least, his corporation was.

Crowley himself awoke at the back of the 'Discorporation Queue' in the Eighth Circle.

Strangely, both Heaven and Hell operate in much the same way when it comes to the disbursement of new physical forms to their Earth-bound operatives. Agents must first fill out forms (in triplicate) which explain what exactly had happened to their previous form, then they must be interviewed by their supervisory angel/demon, and finally, they have to wait in the queue. It should be noted, however, that the motivations for these procedures are vastly different. The Archangels are tasked by their Creator with the maintenance of a bureaucracy ten million strong, forms (in triplicate), interviews, and queues are the only way anything is accomplished at all. Hell does it because, and to quote, "It's fuckin fun."

So, Crowley spent nearly two years (Earth-time) Below waiting for a new corporation to be allotted to him. He spent the vast majority of that time lurking around the shores of the Lake of Fire. It wasn't the nicest place, but it was the closest to that 'beachy feeling' he could find in Hell (he also spent a few months searching through the rotten stacks of pornographic books hoping there might be some nuggets of wisdom about keeping plants alive in between tales of lusty gardeners and lascivious farm hands. He learned quite a lot, but nothing about keeping his plant alive, so he wrote the time off as a waste).

When he finally managed to claw his way back to the surface, the first thing he did was fly to where he had died. His wards zipped in recognition as he crossed them. No one had breached them while he was gone, leaving the balcony and his wine collection untouched. He crossed the rooms in three quick strides and flung open the door to the balcony. There, next to the preternaturally clean bones he had left behind, was the little clay pot. He scooped it up and sighed. The plant was long dead, so shriveled and dry that pieces flaked off when he lifted it into the air. Unceremoniously, he scraped the bits of the dead plant from the container, unearthing the single seed at the center. This he shoved back into the desiccated dirt.

As he walked away, the shriveled leaves caught fire.

Three weeks later the newly planted seed died.

Somewhere along the line, he would never be able to say when exactly, he began hating the plant. Her Most High and Holy clearly did not want him to succeed in stealing this piece of Eden and that was _fine _but he would be damned (again) if he failed to successfully grow a single measly plant.

He planted it again.

Again.

Again.

* * *

**1352 | Sijilmasa, Morocco | 667 Years Before the End of Days**

Aziraphale arrived, flustered by his own tardiness, in a flurry of feathers and mild Miracles of Forgetting to ensure that he did not start a riot. He peered around and then blinked his tunic into something more closely resembling the heavily embroidered robes the men around him were wearing. Then, he entered the dimly building where his superiors told him his task would be waiting. They had been awfully vague about the whole thing, he thought, though of course that was their right and he would never question that. Particularly when his assignment took him out of Europe for a bit. The last few years had been oppressive. He answered what prayers he could, performed what Miracles he could get away with, but mostly he just felt helpless as people died in droves around him. It was an awful business.

Once inside his eyes took a few moments to adjust. It appeared to be a small tea house; the air smelled heavily of cream and the particular mixture of spices that were preferred in the region. A felt a thrill of excitement when he spotted a bowl filled with plump dates on each table. Perhaps he might be able to order a plate of stuffed dates, the last time he was in the region there had been the lovely man serving dates stuffed with honey and almonds and baked on a flat stone in the sun. He was just casting his gaze about for the owner of the establishment when he realized he was being watched.

"Hello there, Angel." The low drawl could only come from one being. Aziraphale felt a small smile twist his lips, despite the stern look he tried to adopt. For all that they were representatives of vastly different ideologies, he could not help but like the demon Crowley. The feeling was especially magnified given the state the demon had been at their last meeting.

"Good afternoon," he responded. "Terrible business back in Italy. I do hope you're well now."

The demon kicked out one exceedingly long leg, knocking the chair across from himself away from the table. Beside Crowley's elbow, there was a little clay pot with two very tiny red sprouts ending in green-edged leaves poking through the dirt.

"Always. Do have a seat, there's a good pigeon." As Crowley spoke he was plucking a single date from the bowl and tearing into it with his fingers, carefully extracting the seed and setting it aside before placing the date pieces back in the bowl.

Aziraphale swallowed, feeling suddenly uncomfortable. Surely, if this was where his task was meant to be, then he should be working to thwart Crowley rather than enjoying a meal with him?

"I am not entirely sure that would be appropriate," he said. "I really should-" The server appeared at his elbow, leaning slightly in front of him to place a plate, piled high with flaky pastry and smelling of honey and turmeric. "Oh dear." He looked up from the plate to see Crowley watching him with an unreadable expression.

"I promise not to tempt any mortals over lunch," Crowley said.

Well, that was alright then, wasn't it? Aziraphale told himself. He sat. Crowley began tearing another date to shreds.

"Help yourself," he said, gesturing with one sticky hand at the plate. He set another seed aside.

The smell was almost overwhelming, "Oh, don't mind if I do." Aziraphale plucked the topmost pastry and bit into it, his teeth sinking through first crisp pastry and then into the sticky sweet date and honey filling inside. He might have moaned, though Crowley was too polite to mention it if he did.

After a moment savoring the treat, he looked up and promptly remembered where he was.

"My apologies," he said. It was blessed inconvenient that mortal bodies blushed, he thought. Crowley's smile never wavered.

"So," the demon said, "What has you in this neck of the woods?" He paused and glanced around the room and then corrected himself, "Or rather, this neck of the desert?"

Aziraphale shot him a stern look, "Most likely I have been sent here to stop whatever nonsense you have cooked up."

"Me?" Crowley had the gall to rest one long-fingered hand on his chest and adopt a look of surprise behind those silly glasses he insisted on wearing. "I'm just here for the dates." And he smiled.

And Aziraphale smiled. He really did enjoy their conversations.

"Well," he said, "So long as it's only for the dates."

The next day Crowley tempted a local landowner into using that year's tax money on a lovely new rug for his mistress's quarters and Aziraphale performed a minor blessing to ensure that the date groves surrounding the city would not succumb to the drought he could feel coming.

"You know," Aziraphale said to Crowley a few nights later when they just so happen to have met back up in the tea house, "I've been thinking about finding a place to call home."

"What?" Crowley sounded just this side of shocked[6].

"There's this lovely little parish just outside of London proper," Aziraphale went on. "Of course, I'm not quite sure what your definition of lovely might include, but I quite like the gardens and the Friar there is such a dear man."

"Why are you telling me this?" Crowley had shifted so his glasses were perched at the very tip of his nose. Aziraphale noted that the plant at his side appeared to have grown quite a bit in the few days since he had seen the demon. The leaves were now broad and trailing down the sides of the little pot, though there were still only two of them.

"No reason really," Aziraphale said. "The thought just occurred to me and I said it." Then, because he had noticed and the plant was quite pretty, he said, "That's a very nice plant you have there. I saw it before; the color really is striking."

Crowley abruptly stood. He snatched up his plant and nodded his head.

"Goodbye, Angel," he muttered as he stalked from the tea house.

"Dear me," Aziraphale said to no one, "I wonder what I said?"

He would not find out what exactly it was that he said for another six-hundred and sixty-seven years, three months and seven days. Not that anyone, least of all the plant, was counting.

* * *

**Footnotes:**

[1] Egypt, not Tennessee, as the later would not be invented for a great many years yet. Ironically, Crowley would also one day buy a small clay device on the streets of Memphis Tennessee, but for a very different purpose with a very different plant

[2] And in fact had avoided those types with all urgency when he himself was still among the Heavenly Host.

[3] Those of you who do know how plants work will recall that typically, in order to produce a seed, a plant should be fully grown and there is typically some sort of pollination process involved. Excluding as always, ferns and mushrooms- they know what they did.

[4] She is rather more keen on wandering about looking smug as people make the decisions she knew they were going to make and shaking her head slightly in warning when people are about to put milk rather than lactose-free creamer in their coffee. Crowley had rather liked her before he Fell and felt rather betrayed by her afterward, after all why hadn't she warned him what one good afternoon with Lucifer and his friends would lead to?

[5] Crowley had changed his name around the time of the Crucifixion, nearly 1300 years earlier but Aziraphale can be forgiven for forgetting as he had known Crowley as Crawly for nearly three times that amount of time. He did feel quite bad about forgetting non-the-less.

[6] His shock is perhaps understandable when one knows this; Aziraphale, in that moment, was the first Angel to ever utter the word home when referring to Earth rather than Heaven. He was also the last angel to utter that sentiment, discounting of course, fallen angels.


	3. The Hidden Font

A/N: This is a shorter one, but it sets up the next which is quite a bit longer. I wanted to get something out to y'all :) A note; I am calling Adam's Birthday Aug 19th, because this is a few weeks before school starts and summer is said to be ending, as far as I am aware there is no canon date? Happy to correct if I'm wrong;

**Chapter 3: The Hidden Font**

**October 31st, 2019 | London, England | 68 days After Adam Said No Thank You**

It may surprise some of you to learn that Halloween is not in fact a particularly demonic day. That is to say, neither the divine host nor the demonic horde lays claim to the day; human thoughts on the matter are, as always, their own. On Halloween night the year the world should have ended, London was filled with a sort of manic energy[1] and Aziraphale had retreated from the chaos surrounding his bookshop to Crowley apartment. He rather liked the irony of an angel slipping away to hide with a demon on the day humans most associated with the Devil.

"Crowley, what is this?" Aziraphale had been inspecting the cartoon of the Mona Lisa with an appreciative eye. Crowley was right, it really was more lovely than the final work. He had turned away from the sketch to see a large glass bowl filled with brightly colored packets on the desk in the middle of the room.

"Hmm?" Crowley was sprawled in an artful mess across his couch, a grey crushed velvet monstrosity Aziraphale was sure the demon had only acquired as some form of insult to good taste. He tilted his head back to see Aziraphale who lifted the glass bowl from the desk.

"Oh that." A positively delighted grin curled the corners of Crowley's lips. "That, angel, is a collection of the most disappointing candies a child could hope to receive on Halloween."

Aziraphale frowned.

"Why do you have them?" He prodded at what appeared to be a mint-and-orange-juice flavored candy cigarette.

"Because they just so happen to be the only candies available in all of London this year and its Halloween. I would be a bad demon if I didn't have any candy to give the kiddies."

Aziraphale concentrated for a moment, changing all the candies in the city back into more traditional Halloween fare with a blink.

"Ah, of course," he said.

"You changed them back, didn't you?" Crowley did not sound too put out so Aziraphale smiled at him.

"Of course I did. I left you these so you can torment whatever children are brave enough to knock on your door."

"It's more than you would think," Crowley groaned. "Last year they egged the door because I didn't have any candy and couldn't be arsed to miracle some for the little buggers."

That startled a laugh out of Aziraphale. Crowley flapped one hand as he spoke again.

"I was oddly proud, to be honest. That takes guts. I mean, they each had nightmares for a week, but I was still proud."

"Little demons after your own heart," Aziraphale agreed. "Oh, I brought that book I was telling you about."

Crowley's lip curled into a faint sneer.

"I can't promise I'll read it any time this century, angel."

"Well, demon, I will continue to live in eternal hope you shall see the light and find joy in the written word." Aziraphale quite enjoyed the way Crowley's eyes crinkled at the corners when he was called 'demon' in a fond tone of voice[2].

Crowley opened his mouth to respond when the doorbell rang.

"So it begins," he said ominously as he stood and took the bowl from Aziraphale's hands. He set his sunglasses on the desktop as he walked towards the door. "Just go put it in the bedroom, yeah?" He jerked his head back towards the long hallway past the garden.

As he exited the main living area he could hear first the excited chorus of children exclaiming over 'how cool those contacts are, mister!' and then the uncomfortable shuffling as they received their subpar treats. He paused to brush a hand across the plants in the garden. They were so lovely. Finding out that Crowley was an avid, if unconventional, gardener had been a wonderful surprise. It was so nice to know that after six millennia they could still surprise each other.

"You are all wonderful," he told the plants. "You're growing so well. I'm very proud of you."

"Stop that," Crowley called from the door, "You're going to make them soft."

The sound of more children clattered down the hallway.

Aziraphale gave the plants one last affectionate pat, Miracled away the hint of rot he could sense in one of their roots, and continued down the hallway towards the statue[3]. Then, he paused. Before the Apocalypse-that-wasn't they had not spent any time at Crowley's flat. In fact, before a few months ago, Aziraphale had not actually known where Crowley lived. Even now they tended to socialize at the bookshop. So, he had never actually seen Crowley bedroom and was quite unsure if it was behind the left or right door.

Reasoning that Crowley couldn't accuse him of snooping if he just took a peek in the left door to see if it was the correct one, Aziraphale stepped forward and pushed the concrete panel aside. What he saw was not the bedroom. Rather, it appeared to have begun its life as a kitchen. Now, however, every possible surface was covered in plants. Huge philodendrons and string-of-pearls that reached from the tops of cabinets to the floor and begonias and violets and more than he could possibly take in. It was a riot of color and life. The smell practically bowled him over as he stepped into the room and allowed the door to swing shut. The rich loam and sweet tang of _life. _He breathed deep. The plants in the garden he had just passed through had none of this vivacity.

He approached the closest plant, a weeping heart in a large pot atop a spindly legged table, and peered at it, wondering what was so different from the other plants and why they were separated. The flowers before him were bright and perfect in shape, but he noticed that the edges of the leaves were slightly yellowed. That was odd. He had never seen any plant of Crowley's be anything but perfect.

He looked to the next. A spot caught his eye. And there, on the little spider plant beside that one, a creeping mold. He leaned closer to a hibiscus on sitting in the sink.

Wait a minute. He recognized that pot. It wasn't a flower pot at all, it was a 15th century holy water font from the Danube region. And it was currently filled with dirt and one very sad looking hibiscus with what appeared to be a leaf mutation. He stepped closer, aware that he only had barest moments before Crowley noticed he was taking longer than reasonable. He reached out, brushing his fingertips along the gilded edge of the font, and then jerked back. Pain. Fear. Death. The feelings were roiling just beneath the surface and suddenly he knew exactly when this pot was from.

Oh dear…

* * *

**Footnotes:**

[1] Neither Crowley nor Aziraphale knew it, but humans were on the whole more perceptive than anyone gave them credit for and this night was to be a collective celebration of having survived something no one quite remembered.

[2] In general, he liked the way Crowley reacted to all forms of affection, though he did not like to think on how out of practice the demon was at receiving it. That just made Aziraphale sad and tended to ruin a perfectly lovely evening.

[3] Aziraphale, if asked, would say that this statue was an 'excellent representation of our eternal struggle with our demons, both internal and external'. He would not say what he truly thought which was this; Crowley was a right bastard who knew very well that 'good' and 'evil' were not wrestling in the statue.

* * *

And of course, you'll find out what exactly happened around that pot next time. Thank you for the kudos and comments, they make my whole day


	4. An Apse in the Weeds

A/N: I really debated between this setting and the eruption of Krakatoa and even wrote quite a bit of the other version. I'm not sure if that'll be included in this story before the end, since I'm not sure it does more to move things forward than this, but ya know- It's out there and if people are interested, I'll add it. :)

Historical Notes: 1) An 'apse' is the circular area at the eastern end of a church which contains the altar, an 'asp' is a poisonous black snake from northern Africa, often called the Egyptian Cobra today.  
2) Vlad Țepeș is the Romanian name for Vlad Drakul III/Vlad the Impaler/the guy who supposedly inspired Dracula stories. Aziraphale uses this name because that's the name that the people around him are using.

Warnings: Discussion of impalement, including the impalement of children. Nothing terribly graphic, but definitely not pleasant.

**Chapter 4: An Apse in the Weeds**

****June 15********th********, 1462 | Vlad the Impaler's Retreat to Târgoviște | 557 Years Before Armageddon ****

A great deal of fuss is made over the Lord's Plan and who She might favor in any given generation. The truth is simply this; the Great Plan is a collection of threads in a billion different colors, constantly being woven into new and previously impossible designs. Sometimes one thread will be caught up in a design She had not planned on, but that is the beauty of the thing; She held all the threads, started them on their paths and, very rarely, gave them little nudges in the right direction, but even She could not predict how exactly the final product would look[1].

As for Her favorites? Well, She is not typically in the business of telling, but there are always a few colors She can't help but check in on. Two of these are woven throughout the entirety of human history; the first a lovely cashmere in shining gold, glinting from between the rich blue of a summer sky and the iridescent cream of pearl, and the other blackest midnight, twined around poppy-crimson and a particular shade of green that she recognized from the nebulae hung by Her Lightbringer.

Just now, those threads are surrounded by a cacophony of colors and textures; roving wool in red the color of sunbaked stone and a crystal clear blue silk, happy colors for happy people, a ribbon in the particular shade of purple associated with those who worshiped Her Son, and most disturbingly, a sickly grey-yellow mohair that writhed up from other portions of the weaving, twisting and knotting the beautiful colors of history into something ugly and cruel. She ran what passed for fingers for an all-encompassing being over the ragged threads.

She could not directly interfere, not with two of Her children already involved, but She sent a tiny spark of hope to the golden cashmere, once more mourning Her lost connection to the other[2].

The bit of hope would have to be enough for the both of them, She thought. Then, a particularly vibrant chartreuse on the opposite end of the tapestry caught Her attention.

She looked away.

The tides of history turned for Vlad Țepeș on a blustery night in June and Aziraphale could not have been happier. He had been traveling behind the vile man's forces for some time now, healing when he could, helping bury the dead when he could not. He spent entire days lifting the poor lost things from where Țepeș put them. His hands constantly ached with the sensation of wood scraping through rent flesh, with the weight of a child pulled from their mother's chest, cold and limp (__God above, so limp, why was this happening, why God? Why?). __No matter how many times he miracled the blood away, his skin was still tight and itchy as if he'd allowed it to dry. He did not sleep, but at night, when the cries of the dying faded away in a few brief moments of respite, he would pause and lean against the closest vertical object he could find and just breathe.

Angels were not supposed to hate, they weren't supposed to even be able to feel that emotion, but Aziraphale hated this place. The hatred writhed through his gut, a sinking black tar that clung to him, rotting and fetid. He felt nauseous.

His only solace was in the knowledge that the new __Kayser-i Rûm__'s[3] forces would show no mercy, that this was maybe the end of Țepeș' current reign of terror. But, then he had had that same thought twice before and the man kept clawing his way back into power.

Now-a-days, Aziraphale liked the finer things in life, the smooth flame of good wine, the curl of steam above a cooking pie, the crackle of fresh pastry filled with spiced dates. But, he was on Earth because he had been a warrior of some acclaim in Heaven; they did not just hand out Holy Flaming Swords to anyone after all. He had not missed his Flaming Sword for many years, but now, oh he wanted it. He wanted to take up the blade and ensure that Vlad Țepeș would not live to harm another innocent.

Barring that, he would settle for even just a small measure of the ability to cause mayhem that Crowley possessed in such abundance. He sucked in a huge breath he did not need and laid his hands on the infected wound in the gut of the young mother prostrate on the ground before him. No one was looking and she was unlikely to ever wake without his interference, so he felt justified in using just a little Divine Intervention to ensure that she woke to see another dawn.

He closed his eyes and waited. He had been healing so many, mostly small things, easing sore muscles so they could run farther or speeding the recovery of broken bones. It added up far more quickly than he had realized and a soul-deep exhaustion tugged at him. Now, his abilities seemed very far away and he had to wait a great deal of time before they sluggishly uncurled to greet him.

He glanced around once more to ensure no prying eyes, before directing the holy energy into the wound. Slowly, too slowly, it began to knit together. The healing began to slow, long before the wound was closed. He frowned and pushed harder. His wings, safely out of sight of any mortals, ached with the effort.

Suddenly, a hand wrapped around his wrist. He jolted violently, jerking his head up, already scrambling to come up with an explanation for why he had been touching the woman that wouldn't end in his discorporation by witch-burning. Then, he processed who exactly owned the fingers currently curled around his wrist.

"Crowley!" he greeted. Then he winced, that had sounded exhausted even to himself. Crowley frowned.

"What in creation do you think you're doing, angel?" His voice was low and dark, his eyes boring into Aziraphale.

He swallowed, "Healing this poor woman."

Crowley's lip lifted in a half snarl. "I can sssee that," he said, "I'm more curious about why you were using yourself to do it."

Oh.

__Oh. __

Aziraphale slowly pulled his hand free from Crowley. He rubbed at the wrist absently, though the demon had not hurt him.

"I, ah, I did not realize." He really hadn't. Of course he would not have used his own essence to heal a human if he had realized he was that drained. That was a quick way to permanent discorporation.

Crowley stared at him.

"You didn't realize?" he asked.

Aziraphale shook his head. "No, I was just trying-"

"To help," Crowley cut him off. Now his voice was very level. "I know." He reached out and brush his fingers across the wound, closing it with barely a trace of a scar left behind.

"Come on," Crowley said. He stood and stalked away. Aziraphale scrambled to catch up.

"Why are you here?" he asked, "Don't tell me Hell supports Țepeș?"

Crowley rolled his eyes. "I know War was all excited about him, but no, I wasn't sent to support him." He looked around them. They were at the edges of a large group of villagers who had fled their homes twice now, first when the Impaler's army marched through on their way to war and again as he retreated, burning everything behind him as he went. "I've been staying ahead of that bastard, encouraging cowardice and selfishness."

Aziraphale smiled, though he was careful to not to let the demon see it. Of course, cowardice was objectively the domain of Below, but in times of war it was one of the best defenses a villager could have. Getting out of the way of the uncaring soldiers was the only way you might survive.

"Come on." Crowley jerked his shoulder in what Aziraphale thought he probably thought was a human gesture but in reality just looked like he wasn't quite sure what to do with the number of limbs he currently possessed.

"Where are we going?" Aziraphale asked even as he started following.

"There are people who need help up here and it seems more like your game than mine," Crowley said. He cast an assessing look back over Aziraphale and wiggled his fingers. "Not magical-healing help either, angel. Normal kind-hearted, softy help."

"And you came to find me." This time Aziraphale did not try to hide his fond smile. Crowley's lip lifted in a sneer.

"Well, it's certainly not my specialty."

They walked in silence through the dark night for a few minutes before Aziraphale heard the soft sounds of crying ahead. Slowly, fires from a few torches illuminated the area. Aziraphale froze.

"This is a church."

Crowley paused as well, twisting his head to peer at Aziraphale.

"Yesss?"

"You can't go in there."

Crowley rolled his eyes again, "Common misconception, angel. Believe it or not, I'm not so damned that I'll burn up on entry."

The thing was, Aziraphale had seen exactly that happen before; a minor demon he'd been sent to dispatch had followed him into a little chapel in Spain and, upon crossing the lintel, burst into flames.

"Are you quite sure?" he asked.

Crowley turned to fully face him and stepped backwards across the threshold of the church grounds. He lifted his hands in a care-free gesture, as if to say, __well? __Aziraphale stared.

As he stared at the fallen angel, illuminated from behind by the flickering torches so that he was no more than a slim shadow and shining teeth, Aziraphale felt the gentle brush of God's fingers through his feathers. He shuddered and suddenly could not contain the rush of __hope __that filled him. Of course they were going to survive this, of course the humans around them were going to be okay, __of course. __

He smiled.

"Well then," he said, "That's excellent." He crossed the threshold as well and started towards the main chapel.

He did not look back at Crowley. If he had, he might have seen the carefree grin fall away into a pained grimace as the demon glanced down at the consecrated ground on which he stood. As he moved to follow Aziraphale, tiny tendrils of smoke curled up from the soles of his shoes.

Once inside, Aziraphale found himself quickly swept up in the many very human ways he could help the people who were fleeing for their lives. He could feel the heavy malice of Țepeș' forces growing ever closer, so he worked as hard as he could to get as many people mobile as he could. He set limbs and wrapped them tightly to splints, he cleaned out wounds with holy water (after very carefully looking around for Crowley to ensure he wasn't anywhere nearby, but the demon had vanished almost as soon as they arrived), and he stitched gashes closed, his fingers steady and his gut roiling.

Before he realized it, the faintest light of dawn was peeking through the windows and nearly half of the villagers in the Church had departed, their injuries stable enough for travel and their fear speeding their steps. As a quiet descended upon the sanctuary, he stood and stretched. He longed to spread his wings and really stretch out his aching muscles, but that would have to wait at least a bit longer.

Aziraphale looked around. There did not appear to be anyone else he could currently help so he decided to try and find Crowley. Perhaps they could take a short walk and enjoy the rising sun before delving back into the miasma of human misery around them?

Despite their decreased numbers, there were so many humans around, so much pain and fear drowning out his senses that Aziraphale found himself still searching nearly a full half-hour later. The sun was fully up now, but he still wanted that walk. Eventually, a priest noticed him floundering and approached.

"May I help you, good sir?" The man's Romanian was lightly accented in the manner of Bavarian nobility. Aziraphale wanted to ask him how he came to be the vicar of a little parish so very far into the wilderness, but his desire to find Crowley overrode his curiosity.

"Ah, uh, yes," he said. "I am looking for my friend. He is, uh, tall and has dark glasses." His Romanian was nearly as rusty as his French at this point and he was far too drained by the constant Miracle working of the last few weeks to utilize his divine gift of Tongues. He settled for gesturing vaguely at his own eyes and then raising his hand into the air to approximate Crowley's (rather over-the-top) height. The vicar smiled in understanding.

"He is in the apse."

Aziraphale stared at him for a moment, sure that he had misunderstood the word. Obviously, Crowley was not affected by the holy ground in the same way an average demon might be, but the apse was just about the holiest place in the building. Surely that wasn't be best place for a demon to be?

"Are you… quite sure?"

The man nodded.

"Well, thank you."

He turned towards the front of the church and made his way through the remaining throngs of terrified humans. The night was just falling and they were beginning to lay down for what rest they could snatch, huddled into little groups of twos and threes, their eyes wide and haunted. He swallowed away his own fear for these people.

The front of the church was quite small by current Orthodox standards, but more than large enough to serve the needs of the largely rural region. There were no holy relics as far as he could sense, a stroke of luck really. No matter his apparently unique relationship with consecrated ground, Aziraphale did not think Crowley would have been able to enter at all had there been anything truly Holy within. He climbed the two steps up onto the dais and found Crowley. The demon was curled into the smallest ball someone his height could manage atop a blanket he had clearly taken from one of the humans. It wasn't nearly as nice as the richly colored textiles that graced the pulpit, but it was thick and even from this far away Aziraphale could sense the aura of death and fear that rolled off it in waves. Less than a body-length behind him was an ornate font, filled to the brim with holy water. As Aziraphale approached, Crowley twitched in his sleep and his hand slipped from the blanket onto the stone floor. He started violently, jerking himself from sleep and to a half-sitting position.

"Damn thiss place!" he muttered. It sounded almost like a wish rather than a curse, Aziraphale thought.

"Are you alright?" he asked. It was rapidly becoming clear that Crowley had lied to him at the entrance and that it was not, in fact, good for a demon to remain in a holy place for a long time. Damning it, he reflected, would actually be a viable course of action, though it was out of their reach.

Crowley did not look up from the fresh, shiny burn he was examining. "I jussst dandy."[4]. The burn appeared to be weeping slightly and Aziraphale had to control the wince that wanted to escape. He couldn't heal Holy Burns, at least not as drained as he currently was. He glanced uncomfortably at the holy water.

Aziraphale stared at him for a long moment, unsure what to say. It was so very rare these days that Crowley was genuinely upset around him. The Arrangement was well into its fourth century and slowly the guilt of 'consorting' with the Adversary was leeching out of him, leaving behind only an odd sort of fondness and the same genuine enjoyment he had felt all those years ago in a little date shop in Morocco.

"I was about to walk the perimeter, if you would like to accompany me." He thought getting out into the fresh air would do the demon a great deal of good. Crowley was always pale and thin but something about this place seemed to lay on his very bones; he looked hollowed out and wan. There was little either of them could do, but stepping away from the press of human misery certainly couldn't hurt. And, if Aziraphale planned their route carefully, he could ensure that the vast majority was outside the hallowed areas of the grounds. Plus, no matter where they walked it would away from the holy water he wasn't sure that Crowley had even noticed. Surely, no matter how upset he suddenly seemed, he would not have chosen to nap in such a dangerous place?

"And why would I do that?" Crowley snapped. He shook his hand and glared out at the rest of the church.

"I just meant you might like to join me in-"

"I'm not going to __join you__. Walking the walls won't change anything." Crowley practically snarled the last words. He gestured expansively at the crowds around them and Aziraphale was suddenly very happy they weren't speaking Romanian. He could see the vitriol building in Crowley's gaze. "This isn't going to just magically work itssself out, angel! My lot won't let me change any of it and I think yoursss want it to happen."

"Now, that's not fair," Aziraphale protested. It wasn't that Crowley was wrong, he had strict instructions to not interfere in whatever Vlad Drakul was planning for the poor people, but surely the greater good…

"No, it's not fair." Crowley suddenly stood from his curled up position. "None of this is fair and worse, none of this is their __choice__. But, then you holier-than-thou-types don't really care about choice, do you?" He spat out 'holy' like a curse. Then, he stalked away into the press of people. There were thin curls of smoke drifting up from the ground where he stepped, leaving behind faintly scorched footprints in a snaking line away from the altar towards the entrance[5].

Aziraphale watched him leave, shocked and hurt that Crowley still thought so little of him after all this time. Of course he knew that Falling still haunted the demon, how could it not? But that had been his __choice__ hadn't it? To rebel? How could he still be so angry about it all these years later?

Eventually, Aziraphale managed to shake himself free of his thoughts. He really did want to walk the walls. Țepeș' forces could be here any time and he wanted to be forewarned. Moreover, he could still feel the fainted brush of the Lord's blessing and he wanted to stoke it with something beautiful in all this pain.

The walk was pleasant, thought it would have been more so if he had had the company he wanted. He greeted the few men with weapons and used a little of his slowly rebuilding energy to bless their weapons. It would not last long, but it might make the difference between life and death for those inside. He made two full circuits of the church grounds before he heard it. A voice shouting, hoarse and thin, somewhere below.

He moved towards the stairs down from the wall. Nothing good could come of yelling just now, people needed to work together to survive. Just before he stepped onto the stairs he spotted a thick bloom of smoke from the direction of the village where he had been trying to heal the young mother. He sent a quick prayer Above that they innocents had all managed to get out before Țepeș arrived. Then, he checked that the men around him had seen. They had, they were clustered into a small ground, staring out at the smoke with terrified looks on their faces. He sighed.

He really couldn't wait for this century to end.

Once off the wall, Aziraphale found himself in the Church's small garden. There were three squat olive trees and a few boxes he thought probably housed bees. It had all fallen into slight disrepair, but it was charming in a neglected sort of way.

"Why the fuck are you like this?" Aziraphale jumped. That wasn't just any voice, that was Crowley and he sounded furious. He crept forward, looking around for the demon and whoever he was yelling at. Heaven above, he hoped another demon hadn't deigned to join them.

He found a spot to hide behind the largest of the olive trees and peered out. There was Crowley, alone and agitated in a way Aziraphale had never before seen from the usually languid demon.

Crowley was pacing back and forth, his feet kicking up strangely as he moved. The smoke from the soles of his shoes was thicker now and Aziraphale could see burns spreading up bare forearms, violently red at the edges and a sickly white at the center.

"You have one purpose and you can't even manage that properly!" Crowley snarled. He gestured violently at something on the ground in front of him. Aziraphale narrowed his eyes, trying to see through the shadows cast by the still low stun and the thick olive leaves.

"Just fucking grow already! I mean for fuck's sake."[6]. He took two steps away, his shoulders heaving and Aziraphale saw it. A tiny pot with even tinier leaves poking through the soil. It was somehow familiar, he was sure he'd seen it before, but just then he couldn't remember when.

Then, Crowley's words sank in. He was yelling at the plant. Surely, that wasn't the way this worked? Aziraphale would admit to being unclear about the exact mechanics of plant growth, but he was positive that they did not respond to this sort of thing.

"You're lucky I'm ssstill giving you water, you pissant excussse for a plant." Crowley threatened. He kicked at the ground and then hissed in pain as a lick of flame curled up around his boot.

"I should just leave you here. Maybe a nice impaling is what you need."

A strange feeling was rising in Aziraphale. This was wrong. Everything about it. A demon willingly standing on holy ground, not-so-slowly burning himself up from within and for what? He didn't have to stay after showing the sanctuary to Aziraphale. And yet.

Crowley stooped and snatched up the little pot, holding it at eye level as he said, "I'm giving you one lassst chance, plant, to __grow better__." He voice was low and filled with all the vile intent of Hell itself.

Worse, at least to Aziraphale, was the way the snarled words seemed directed at something beyond the plant. They were filled with a sort of loathing that Aziraphale had never heard before, not from Crowley who seemed able to find the positive in anything[7]. The plant was innocent, by its very definition and to hear Crowley threaten it with death hurt something deep inside Aziraphale. He leaned forward and a stick crunched beneath his boot.

Oh dear, he thought, as Crowley's head whipped up. His eyes, so rarely uncovered these days, were black, his pupils blown in his fury.

"Assiraphale," he hissed. The little pot vanished into the voluminous black cloak Crowley had taken to wearing in the last few decades.

There were two routes he could take here, Aziraphale knew. In the first, he could confront Crowley about what he had just witnessed. He could reach into the cloak and take the plant and ask what exactly Crowley was trying accomplish though his threats. And, he could lose his friend entirely if he pushed too hard. That much was clear by the way the lean demon seemed poised to flee at the slightest provocation. He had stopped moving entirely and the faint smell of burning flesh was beginning to permeate the air around them. The scent spurred the second option to the forefront of Aziraphale's mind. By that route, he could take Crowley by the hand and leave this place. There were still so many people in the path of Țepeș' forces. Yes, they had both been forbidden to interfere with the retreat itself, but they could do a great deal of Good by warning everyone they could find.

He chose the second option.

Without another moment's hesitation he strode out from behind the tree and took up Crowley's hand.

"What are you doing?" Crowley tried to wrest himself free, but Aziraphale was not above using what little Divine strength he had regained to ensure the demon was trapped.

"My people say that these villagers must die as martyrs to inspire faith in the others," he said, "I assume yours hope that these deaths will shake their faith." He did not give Crowley a chance to respond. They were approaching the gate that would lead them from hallowed ground back into the fray.

"So," Aziraphale continued, "I am going to thwart your evil plans by saving every human I can get my hands on and you are going to prevent my holy purpose by doing the same and then we're going to go to someplace very far away from here and have a nice lunch."

Crowley was gaping at him but they had reached the gate. Aziraphale paused. It was suddenly very important to him that Crowley chose to follow him. So, he took one step outside the gate and twisted to face Crowley as best as he could while still holding the demon's hand tightly in his own.

"Now, you don't have to do this of course," he said. He loosened his grip on Crowley hand, but did not let go just yet. "It's your choi-"

Before he could finish the word, Crowley was rushing from the consecrated ground and into the wider world.

"Let's go," Crowley said, his voice was tight with some emotion Aziraphale did not recognize but that sounded far less fraught than it had mere moments before. "I have some damned holy plans to stop and I'm itching for temptation."

It would not be until many (many) decades later in the rubble of a very different church halfway across the world, that Aziraphale would realize Crowley __chose__ to continue holding his hand long after they left the consecrated ground behind in search of people to save.

A few decades after that realization, Aziraphale would take a wrong turn in Crowley's apartment and find the holy water font from that doomed church sitting in an unused sink, housing a particularly wilted hibiscus.

* * *

**Footnotes: **

[1] The human portion of this blanket is relatively small, but particularly favored by the most Divine. Some of the brightest threads in all of creation went into that tiny corner and She was constantly being pleasantly surprised by the wonderful patterns the beings of that little planet dreamt up.

[2] That which She touched became the Most Holy, to touch her Fallen son would be to destroy him, no matter how the separation pained her.

[3] This is the traditional title for the ruler of the Ottoman Empire. Traditional here should be read as having been established nearly 9 entire years previously.

[4] He was not, as he put it, 'dandy'. In fact, he had been having a rather horrible dream about the last time he upset Hastur while Below and spent a few years impaled upon a terrifically thorny wooden pike. It was not a pleasant memory and being here, with the Impaler so close was making his chest ache in remembered agony.

[5] Neither would ever visit this particular church again, but in the coming years a legend would arise about those footprints, leading away from the apse as they did. The legend would talk of an angel driving a demon from this holy place and protecting the people. It was, surprisingly, not terrifically inaccurate.

[6] Crowley had quite embraced the vulgar vocabulary in each language as it developed. He especially liked terms that had nothing whatsoever to do with heaven or hell. It was an oddly endearing trait in Aziraphale's mind.

[7] Despite his demonic status, both Aziraphale and Crowley would be forced to admit, if asked, that Crowley was the more optimistic of the pair.


	5. Keep The Home Fires Burning

A/N: The title of this chapter is a reference to a popular British song from WW1 by the same title. Some particularly relevant lyrics are;  
_For no gallant son of Freedom_  
_To a tyrant's yoke should bend,_  
_And a noble heart must answer_  
_To the sacred call of "Friend"_

Thank you so much for the comments! I absolutely adore seeing which bits resonate for folks (and which bits maybe don't work as well! it's a learning process y'all). Content Warning: Crowley is not in a good place in this chapter w.r.t. his mental health. It's the culmination of the hints we've seen from Aziraphale's POV for the last few chapters, but more explicit here. So, if reading someone else's anxiety/self-loathing is a trigger for you, please proceed with caution. I can promise things will start to look up after this chapter!

**Chapter 5: Keep the Home Fires Burning**

**October 31st, 2019 | London, England | The 68th Day of the Rest of Their Lives**

The real rub of it was this; things were supposed to be _better _after apocalypse that wasn't. And, on the surface, they were. Neither Above or Below had bothered them for nearly a quarter-year (by far a record for Below and approaching one for Above), Adam was proving to be a genuinely entertaining boy who Crowley found himself enjoying the company of on the rare occasions Aziraphale convinced him they should visit Tadfield[1], and there was, of course Aziraphale. Without the need to keep up pretenses, they were free to genuinely be themselves now. Crowley could cause the small mischiefs he loved so dearly and Aziraphale could over-tip to extravagance without Above commenting.

What this really meant, in practice, was that they could make the world a more Human place without hardly any effort on their own parts, save that which they truly wanted to expend. The freedom was intoxicating.

So, everything was more perfect than it had ever been, save for maybe the time before the Fall. There was no reason for the skin on Crowley's arms to have an ever-present crawling sensation, as if there were thousands of tiny ant marching across him. There was no reason why he should be having dreams of flying which were really dreams of Falling, of fire- both the Hellish sort and the regular book-burning sort.

No reason at all.

And yet.

Yet.

The plant still _would not grow right. _

Crowley did everything.

In August he bent the sunlight to hit the garden in his flat at just the right angle.

Dead.

In September, he threatened. He whispered how he hated them and how they would die.

He was right. Dead.

In October, his mind already aflame, he burned them. This was, obviously, counter-productive. Worse than that, it didn't even make him feel any better.

Nothing he did changed any of the facts.

Find seed. Place seed in soil. Water every day. Provide with ample sunlight. Bless. Miracle. Pray.

Watch as it shriveled and died.

Find seed.

Nothing ever changed.

The damn plant refused to ever grow any longer than it took to form a single, perfect seed.

Crowley felt as if he were coming apart at the seams. He was full to bursting with something, some emotion he had no words for. It ached and tore at him and sometimes he just wanted to scream and scream and scream, for what, he had no blessed idea.

For Michael to send him a few archangels to fight[2]

For the fish to fall from the sky again.

For the bookshop fires he could still smell to stop flickering and just _burn him up. _

He always managed to swallow the screams back, though they tasted like bile. Oddly, it was hardest when he was around Aziraphale. He had spent so many years hiding nothing[3] from the angel that now it felt unnatural to conceal this.

He always managed to pull on a passable expression around Aziraphale though and he had no reason to suspect that the angel thought anything amiss.

Until Halloween.

Distracted by the clear adoration of his eyes by the roving children, it had taken Crowley far too long to realize that Aziraphale had not returned from placing the book in his bedroom. A chill swept though him. He placed the large bowl of terrible candy on the ground outside his door, let the little heathens take as much as their gluttonous, greedy little paws could grab[4]. Then, he turned on his heel and stalked towards the rear of the flat.

He paused only briefly in the garden to remind the plants that Aziraphale's kind (_painful, why were they painful?_) words were not true and that they should not slack off because the angel would not save them. Their trembling, lessened as it always was by Aziraphale's Holy Being, returned in full force. A grim smirk crossed Crowley's face.

Aziraphale said kind things to them. He shouldn't do that, Crowley thought, it wasn't right for them to receive mixed signals about their worth. They were nothing and they meant even less. Aziraphale should not confuse them with his goodness. He turned away from the plants.

Before him stood the statue he had bought on a whim and then, despite how uncomfortable it often made him for no discernible reason, found himself unable to part with. To the right was his bedroom. The door was tightly sealed and completely undisturbed, as it had been for the last three weeks. Ever since he found himself unable to sleep for the dreams.

To the left was the formerly-a-kitchen-now-his-deepest-shame room. Of course, that was clearly where he was going to find Aziraphale.

Muttering imprecations against nosy do-gooders, he took the last few steps and pushed the door open. It moved in a silent arc (no door in his home would ever dare creak unless expressly ordered to do so).

Inside, Aziraphale stood with one hand on the holy water font that currently held a mutated hibiscus. He had a terrifically sad expression on his face. It tore at Crowley's already decimated innards, ripping away at the same spot the fire was slowly turning to charcoal.

"What are you doing here?" he bit the question out before pausing to think about how best to handle the situation.

Aziraphale jumped and spun to face him.

"Oh!" He smiled up at Crowley as if everything were just fine. It was not. Crowley tried to pull together the threads of emotion elicited by seeing Aziraphale, perfect smiling Aziraphale, amongst Crowley's more tangible failures.

"You keep them." Three words. Three words and suddenly Crowley couldn't take it. He needed to be alone. Aziraphale always radiated Light in a way that half burned and half made him want to bask for the next few centuries, but now, now it seemed like that light was peeling away every defense he had. A sharp knife, a flaming sword, slipping under his flesh and peeling it up to reveal the rotten core of him.

"Out." Distantly, he knew this was ridiculous. Aziraphale had every right to be here. Aziraphale had every right to everything that Crowley was, a room filled with failed plants that he could not bring himself to kill was part and parcel with that. But that thought was too frail to surface in the roiling sea of utter despair that had swamped him.

"What?" Aziraphale stepped forward, his fingers lifting from the Holy font. He raised his hand towards Crowley's face. "My dear, whatever is the matter with you? The last time I saw you this pale you were about to-"

"Get. Out." Crowley leaned away from Aziraphale's outstretched hand. He was sure that if something as perfect as Aziraphale touched him just then he would combust; the fire inside leaping up to eat at what little of _himself _remained.

Aziraphale froze. Crowley stared at the white-washed concrete behind him. He could feel the weight of Aziraphale's gaze on him.

"Crowley…"

"Please." The word escaped Crowley's lips before he could stop it, ragged and weary in a way that he never wanted to appear before another being, much less one so dear to him.

He heard a sharp intake of breath, though he could not say if it was himself or Aziraphale. And then;

"Of course, my dear," Aziraphale murmured, "You need only ask."

He turned his head away, unable to watch as Aziraphale left the room. Just as the door started to swing shut behind the angel, he spoke again.

"I hope," he said, his voice barely more than a whisper, "that you will call me when you're feeling better. I do apologize for my part in your distress, if I have played one."

Then he was gone and Crowley was alone.

He had no concept of how long he stayed there, frozen in the middle of his kitchen, before his legs began to shake and he collapsed against the wall. By the time he had slid to the floor there was a large bottle of terrible wine with an extraordinarily high alcohol content waiting for him.

He ripped the cork out with his teeth. The first sip burned and he relished in it. Real, tangible fire to drown the one in his gut.

He took another sip.

Another.

Another.

In the far corner of the kitchen, under a miniature star created for its sole use, the little plant began to wither once more.

* * *

**Footnotes: **

[1] So far, they had traveled the 134.3 kilometers from Soho to Tadfield twice; once on a rather blustery Saturday afternoon in September and once just the week previously. On both occasions, Aziraphale insisted they stop for tea at Anathema's cottage before they could depart. Crowley liked Anathema, he really did, but the poor girl could not brew a proper pot of tea to save the Universe.

[2] The fact that he would never survive a fight with being that so far outstripped his capabilities was a thought that he stayed carefully away from.

[3] This is, perhaps, an exaggeration. After all, Crowley certainly had not ever shown the plant to Aziraphale intentionally, nor had he ever revealed that it was Eve who gave him a name for his newly acquired demonic form. But, he did not consider these to be truly 'hidden' rather, they were merely 'not stated'.

[4] He rather liked children for a number of reasons, but their unfettered joy in 'sinful' behavior was a particular favorite of his.


	6. Wither and Dither

A/N: Hello again! We're popping back into Aziraphale's head for a bit. I intended for this chapter to be quite a bit longer and more resolution-filled, but in the end, I like where it cuts off so I added a chapter to the overall story :) As always, y'all's comments are like actual magic. Thank you so much, they mean the world.

**Chapter 6: Wither and Dither**

****November 2nd, 2019 | Westchester, London, UK | 70 Days after The World Stopped Spinning****

It had been nearly two entire days since Aziraphale heard from Crowley. Eleven years ago, that would not have been unusual, in fact, it would have been the standard state of affairs. For all that Aziraphale had long ago given up the pretense that he felt anything more negative than affection for Crowley, their interactions pre-Warlock had been sparse[1]. However, since taking on the responsibility of attempting to sway the budding (not)anti-Christ they tended to see each other in passing more days than not. Most of the time these interactions consisted of Nanny Ashtoreth bringing Brother Francis a cuppa while young Warlock was playing outside[2], or of carefully timed bus rides home in the evening where they might update one another, hidden by the wails of the ever-present unhappy babies that public transport seemed to spawn. Now, just over two months since they defied Above and Below in one fell swoop, their meetings were almost daily, if in fact they separated at all. Crowley had spent a good many nights sprawled across Aziraphale's genuinely hideous loveseat, long legs akimbo in what Aziraphale was positive was not technically an anatomically possible pose. Yes, he always had the ready excuse of 'I'm drunk I shouldn't drive'[3], to which Aziraphale would only smile indulgently and think the flames a tad higher in the hearth.

All of this is to say that utter silence from Crowley for two days (one day, 23 hours, 17 minutes and counting to be accurate) was more than a little upsetting, especially given the state of the poor demon at their parting.

It curdled something deep in Aziraphale's gut to remember the utterly defeated tone in Crowley's voice as he told him to leave. Even when they were still playing at being enemies the demon had never sounded that utterly spent, as if the entire weight of the world had stood upon his shoulders and ground him to mere dust. Aziraphale wanted nothing more than to reach out and sooth away the ache of whatever it was that hurt him so. But, that required being permitted to be near him, and Crowley had asked him to leave. He'd said /please/ and Aziraphale would not, without good reason, violate Crowley's autonomy by defying that request.

So he waited.

He spent the first night beside his phone, cataloging the already-cataloged books that Adam had left for him in the shop and telling himself that Crowley would call. When dawn broke and the phone remained silent he decided to go for a walk.

He spent the rest of the morning slowly ambling down the path beside the water in St. James' park. One of the ducks, the one with the distinctive crest that Crowley had killed and then resurrected, followed along making quiet little sounds that Aziraphale tried not to interpret as concern.

When no demons appeared to join him on his walk he tried for the little pub Crowley sometimes retreated to when he was mad at the world. It was early for a pint, but Aziraphale ordered a pot of tea and a few of the delicious scones the owner's daughter had taken to baking and very carefully tried not to look like he was being stood up. He wasn't, not really, but it felt like the way being stood up was described in the dime novels he would never admit to having a small collection of in the back room of the shop.

As the afternoon bled into evening humans began streaming into the pub. Aziraphale took a few moments to watch them, basking in the knowledge that these people were safe and free to live their lives at least in a small part due to his and Crowley's actions. But, Crowley never appeared and finally, his tea long cold and the scone sitting heavily in his stomach, Aziraphale retreated back to the shop.

Once inside, he checked the wards Anathema had kindly laid for him. He was obviously capable of setting his own warding, and had done so many years ago, but if there was one failing both Above and Below shared it was underestimating humans. Aziraphale quite liked the idea of using human magic to protect his home. The wards would alert him if anyone with more than the usual human spark of divinity tried to enter the building. There had been no ping of alert telling him Crowley had entered, but the demon was there so often, sometimes the wards did not go off when he-

The shop was empty and dark, lit only by the yellow light of the street lamp struggling its way though 200 year old glass panes.

Aziraphale sighed.

Really, he told himself, a day was not terribly long. Of course Crowley wouldn't seek him out today. He needed time to calm down from whatever it was that was upsetting him. The thought was logical and likely correct, but it sat poorly with him. His desire to respect Crowley's wishes warred with his natural inclination to worry and he ended up spending another night seating beside the phone waiting for a call that never came.

The next day dawned with the cool grey light of a London autumn. Fog clung to the corners of buildings and humans whose work required early arrival seemed to hunch in on themselves as they hurried down the street. It all matched Aziraphale's bleak mood perfectly.

He sat, as he had all night long, beside the silent phone. The books were all cataloged and his tax documents were all in order (as they always were) and he found himself at loose ends. He sighed deeply and a small cloud of dust whirled up from the top of a stack of books.

Right. Okay.

He was going to give Crowley the time he needed and not dwell. The shop needed cleaning and he needed a distraction. So, rather than Miracle the dust away as usual, he instead Miracled himself a rather old fashioned feather duster and short step-ladder and got to work.

The day passed rather quickly in this manner and he soon found his worries drifting away in the rhythmic sweep-tap of dusting each book. It was nice to go over every item in his collection by hand, running his fingers along the spines and remembering the efforts he had put forth to acquire each one.

It was not until his phone rang that he realized just how much of the day had slipped past him. For a brief moment he was tempted to let the call go unanswered, it was likely only a customer inquiring about his hours or stock, before the reason for his anxiety filling cleaning spree swept back over him. He stumble doff the stepladder, vanishing it and the duster without conscious thought as he hurtled across the cluttered space for his desk.

The final ring had just faded out when he snatched up the receiver and gasped out, "Crowley?"

"Uh, no, actually," a very human voice answered him.

Bitter disappointment twisted his lips into a grimace, though he tried his best to keep it from his voice as he spoke.

"Anathema, my apologies, I was just waiting for Crowley to call about-" He cast about, hoping for a quick excuse to get the witch off the phone. He liked their chats, she was clever and more intuitive than he thought any human had a right to be, but just then he was terrified that Crowley would call and he would miss it while gossiping away.

She interrupted before he could finish the sentence.

"Oh, so he's okay then?"

"What?" That was not the way their conversations usually went. Typically, Anathema regaled him with some tale of Agnes Nutter and her fulfilled prophecies before their conversation devolved into a critique of modern Covens and the merits of one divining ritual over another. She very rarely mentioned Crowley, though Aziraphale knew they spoke on occasion as well.

"Crowley, he's alright?"

"Why do you ask?" Aziraphale wanted to say yes, but he tried very hard not to violate the 10 commandments (it seemed the least he could do after all) and lying was a pretty big one in the grand scheme of things.

"It's just," Anathema took a deep breath and then spoke rapidly, as if she were trying to get the words out before her courage failed her. "I've been having these dreams, flashes really, just as I'm falling asleep or waking up and they're not visions, I'm not Agnes, but they are uh, accurate."

Well, that was unexpected. Of course Aziraphale knew that the gift of prophecy, though rare, did tend to occur in family lines. He wondered if more of Anathema's ancestors would have discovered it had they not been bound to studying another's words. He was about to say something along these lines, something comforting and kind, when the implication of their conversation thus far sank in.

"And you had one of these, ah, flashes about Crowley?" The receiver creaked under his suddenly tight grip.

"Yes."

"Tell me."

He heard her swallow and the muffled sound of someone else speaking in the background.

"He's alone," she said after a moment, "In the dark. I can't see where he is, but the walls are white and smooth."

Aziraphale struggled not to panic. White walls and loneliness could be anywhere, but he was an angel who never quite fit in in the Host and his first thought was of Heaven.

"Is he alive?" The words burned as they slipped from him.

"Yes," she said quickly, "His eyes are closed and he's on the ground, but he's alive. I'm sure of it."

Palpable relief filled him. Alive. Okay. He could work with alive and in heaven. It would be complicated and the demon was sure to be in rough shape; the acrid scent of burning flesh from the monastery in Romania filled his mind before he shoved it away. Crowley was different then, he told himself, besides the demon had walked though heaven unharmed not two months ago. Surely he would be alright until Aziraphale could find him. He ignored the insidious little thought that Crowley had only been unharmed then because he was wearing Aziraphale's corporation.

"Is there anything else?" He found himself asking without really thinking about it.

The muffled voice spoke again, close enough this time for Aziraphale to recognize it as Newton[4], though he still could not understand what was said.

"Oh, right," Anathema said, "The plants."

All of Aziraphale's half formed plans for sneaking into heaven and absconding with his demon shriveled up.

"What?" he asked.

"Where ever he is, he's surrounded by plants."

Aziraphale breathed a sigh of relief. He had no idea what Anathema was getting vision of Crowley in his apartment, but there had not been a single plant in heaven since Eden was lost[5].

"Oh, that's quite alright then." Aziraphale started to say but Anathema was not done.

"It's hard to tell," she said, "There's a lot of smoke hiding things, but I think the plants are burning?"

Aziraphale was out the door before the phone hit the desktop, leaving Anathema to call out to an empty bookshop, more worried than ever.

* * *

**Footnotes:**

[1] Sparse by human standards of course. They tended to meet on purpose at least a half-dozen times a year and just-so-happen to be in the same place far more often than that. Aziraphale called these unplanned meetings 'divine provenance'. Crowley called them 'the result of careful planning'

[2] And proceeding to give very carefully polite lectures about why slugs were not, in fact, good for gardens, whatever are you thinking dear man?

[3] They both conveniently did not mention the simplicity of sobering up in these moments, nor did Aziraphale mention that on more than one occasion Crowley had used that excuse without a drop of wine crossing his lips beforehand.

[4] The two humans had decided to take things slow after the Apocalypse-that-wasn't and were currently nothing more than flat-mates. Newt, finally realizing that his future did not lie with technology had been working his way though a dog-eared copy of 'Knitting for Dummies' from the Tadfield library. The last time Aziraphale spoke with him he seemed very excited about the parallels between binary computer coding and knitting. Aziraphale had not understood a word of what he was saying.

[5] This was not strictly accurate. There had not been a single plant in Heaven since the Morningstar rebelled and the heavenly greenhouses where burned in the first use of hellfire.


	7. Doubt Thou the Stars Are Fire

A/N: This was going to be Aziraphale arriving at Crowley's flat, but Crowley needed a bit more time in the limelight soo...enjoy?

Chapter title from Hamlet;  
_"Doubt thou the stars are fire;_  
_Doubt that the sun doth move;_  
_Doubt truth to be a liar;_  
_But never doubt I love."_ (Act 2, Scene 2)

Y'all are amazing! Thank you so much for the comments, they're little bits of happiness in ones and zeros.

There's a bit of a lengthy note at the end of this chapter about the names I used for the fallen angels, so if you like biblical minutiae boy howdy do I have a treat for you! That being said, if you're aware of a more accurate assessment than what I did, please let me know!

**Chapter 7: Doubt Thou the Stars are Fire**

Despite Crowley's love of all things astronomical (including, but not limited to, astronomical bodies, astronomical phenomena, and astronomically high prices for everyday items), strictly speaking, it was Samael who hung the stars. He[1], was the Lightbringer in every way that the word might be meant; he radiated joy to all around him, bringing what amounted to a smile to what amounted to the face of each angel he encountered, no matter their rank or disposition. He collected followers in the same way a bowerbird collects brightly colored scraps of fabric; lovingly filling out his collection with the best and most brilliant angels in the Host. Rahab-who-would-become-Leviathan with her ink-black feathers like the fathomless depths of the seas(She was the only other Fallen who took on a serpent form and Crowley had always felt a sort of kinship with her because of that). Ashmedai-who-would-become-Asmodeus with his quick wit and clever hands. Beal-who-would-become-Berith with wings the color of spilled blood and a gift for healing the small hurts collected by sparring angels. Asteraoth-who-would-become-Astarot who sang the most beautiful melodies as they danced among the stars, prompting all to cease their work to listen. And, the most beloved of all his followers, Hesperael-who-would-become-Beelzebub who delighted other angels with their grace as they flew and who was partners in everything with Samael; two halves of a whole, the morning and the evening stars ever rotating each other in an endless dance.

At the edges of this glorious retinue was Crowley, who did not remember his old name or rank, but who remembered that he liked fire and questions and that Samael had always been eager to answer those questions when the other archangels scolded him for even thinking of them. He could not understand what was so wrong about thinking of questions and asking them. Surely he was just trying to understand the majesty of Her Creation more wholly? Samael understood that and he took the angel-who-would-become-Crawly-who-would-become-Crowley under his wings and led him far away from the rest of Heaven, into the black. There, Samael showed him how to take the energy that surrounded them all, the physical manifestation of God's love, and turn it into stars.

The best way to describe this process to a human is to compare it to the creation of a skein of yarn.

First, one must shear the energy from the universe, loosing it just enough that it could be manipulated separately from the rest of the fabric of space and time. Then, the energy is carded, back and forth for eons until it is fine and gossamer. The carded strands are then gathered up and held in one hand while a spindle is manipulated by the other. At this point gravity takes over and the carded energy is pulled inextricably onto the spindle, spun ever tighter until a fine yarn is created. This yarn may then be carefully wrapped around itself in a glowing nexus of energy. If you are human and understood this metaphor, excellent, now please understand that the creation of the stars was nothing like this at all.

Crolwey never got the knack for the spinning bit, it was fiddly and precise in a way that he could not be. But, he excelled at curating the thin fibers of energy into something ordered and useful. He would spend untold time carefully separating out the individual threads from the whole of the universe and laying them out side by side. As he worked reds and greens and the most brilliant blues emerged. The blues were his favorite. It was a little vain, but they reminded him of the shine of his own feathers when starlight caught them just right; deep blue with a sheen of iridescent purples and greens.

Once the energy was prepared, Samael would come to him. He praised Crowley, exclaiming over the beauty of his creation, over the delicate whorls of dust suspended in the aether. Then, he would take Crowley's work and make it More. He gathered up the fibers and under his loving touch they tightened and spun together until they began to glow as fusion ignited. Fire where there had been none. The light would sing through them, exalting Creation in a way no choral hymn ever could for Crowley.

Then, Samael would take the young star and place it among the remnants of Crowley's work. There, nestled amongst the prepared threads of energy, it would grow[2]

Crowley, both as an angel and a demon, was not one to follow blindly, but how could he not love Samael when the archangel created such beauty so effortlessly?

Besides, he'd always liked fire and Samael was nothing if not fire incarnate; warm and loving and safe.

Then, Samael started talking about dangerous ideas and suddenly the fires he hung in the sky were hotter and hungrier than ever. Crowley retreated a little from the archangel, afraid for reasons he could not fully comprehend. But, he still had questions, so many questions, and Samael was still the only one who would answer them.

So, when Samael came to him and invited him to join the rest in the creation of a final, _magnificent_ work he agreed.

Crowley would never use the word magnificent to describe what came next.

Terrible.

Awesome.

Final.

He'd always liked fire and then he was Falling though it, the warmth in which he had taken so much comfort eating away at the core of him until there was nothing left and he was a husk, broken and nameless on the shores of the Lake of Fire, weeping for a loss he could only barely comprehend. His beautiful blue wings nothing more than fragile charcoal and raw nerves.

He'd always liked fire.

Aziraphale had left him. It was what he told the angel to do, he _knew_ that in his head, but the only thing in his chest was a yawning chasm, screaming for something, anything to fill it. The fire of falling had burnt up his ability to complete himself and now he had sent away the only being who had ever made him feel whole.

Across the room, sitting under a tiny star Crowley made to light the windowless space, the plant seemed to mock him. When he woke up (three mornings ago now?) it was vibrant; small triangular leaves tipped in a yellowy-red just beginning to curl over the edge of the little pot. Now, as he got progressively drunker, it seemed to mirror his physical state; wilting and turning brown even as he watched. His upper lip curled in a snarl and he hurled the bottle across the room. It shattered against the concrete wall and reappeared, whole and refilled, at his side.

The plants began to shake ever so slightly. They were no longer accustomed to the terror the plants in the main garden endured. Before today, this room was a rarely visited sick ward where plants who failed to perform were taken and given time to recover before being donated to a local nursery or random person on the street. They might not like Crowley, you cannot like the merciful face of a vengeful God, but they did not fear him anymore.

Except.

The newest among them had still been a seedling in the main garden two months ago when the world was ending. It had no concept of Armageddon, but it had born witness to the desperation that suffused Crowley in those days. Just now, it recognized the tightness at the corners of his eyes, unhidden by his glasses he had never put back on after handing out candy to the children.

It was afraid and it began to tremble and it doomed itself.

Crowley, who was currently trying to force the spilled wine up from the floor on the opposite side of the room and into his stomach, caught the movement of the plant out of the corner of his eye.

It was a small fern whose leaves had never been anything but yellowed and spotted and he was suddenly furious. It was one thing for a plant as holy as the First Seed to dare defy him, but these? These were nothing, how dare they refuse to grow? He levered himself to his feet, staggering until his groping hand managed to find the wall.

"I'gve you a sssecond sshance," he slurred, glaring at the fern. It quaked harder. He took a single, staggering step towards it before realizing he did not have the spirit-corporation coordination to walk just then. His glare intensified.

"A sssecon' sshanse," he said, "And yer ssstill makin th'sssame misstakess?"

The fury escalated, rising to a peak outside the reach of his already tenuous control and then bursting forth from him in the form of tiny sparks. As he watched, the sparks swirled around the room in a sickly parody of the nebulae he loved so dearly, mocking him with the image of the last thing he did truly _right_. He snarled and slashed his hand through them, desperately trying to dissipate the cruel reminder.

His clumsy efforts were rewarded by the sparks falling from their suspended positions onto whatever was below them. Normally, a single spark is not enough to ignite the water-suffused cellulose fibers of a plant. But, these were not normal sparks, they were the seeds of hellfire and their demon was still furious.

The plants caught fire. Those which were spared by the initial ignition, were quickly overtaken as the hellfire spread from leaf to leaf, ever hungry.

Crowley watched this for a moment before his already tenuous connection with standing failed and he collapsed back against the wall. In less that a minute every single plant in the room had been engulfed in flame and the ceiling was thick with acrid black smoke. He could just see the little pot he bought on the streets of Memphis beginning to crack from the heat when his legs gave out entirely and he sank to the floor once more.

Good, he thought, hellfire was the only thing that could destroy something that Holy. He would finally be free of the blessed thing.

Quick tongues of flame licked up the sides of the concrete room. He paid them no mind. The fire could have this room and all the air in it and the rest of the apartment would be no worse-for-the-wear beyond a little smoke smell. He did not need to breathe, though he often enjoyed it, the sheer mechanical nature of the action was grounding in its own way. They were contained here, there was nothing they could travel along to the other rooms and he'd long ago disabled the fire alarms in the entire flat[3]

He leaned his head back against the wall. Compared to the heat radiating from the fire before him, the concrete was still quite cool. He felt trapped, caught between the cool balm of the wall and the oppressive heat before him in a way that, as someone bordering on cold-blooded, he was unaccustomed to. Distantly, he realized he was shivering. He tried to summon the energy to care about his corporation clearly not cooperating, but came up empty.

Empty. Ha. He was always empty. Once again the chasm in his chest shrieked out. Wine. He needed more-

Blearily he reached to take another sip of the terrible wine only to find it had not only changed itself to rotgut when he wasn't looking, but was now sludgy mess of ash. He glared balefully at it for a moment but it stubbornly refused to change back into something more palatable. He drank it anyway, the ash slithered down his throat and settled in his gut and suddenly he was laughing. He was ash. Ash and fire and death and and and he couldn't stop laughing.

He'd always liked fire.

* * *

**Footnotes:**

[1] Please take the English masculine singular pronoun 'he' here as momentary fact. The angel who would later become the devil has gender in the same way a black hole has gender; one and all and none and sometimes one-and-all-and-none at once and sometimes only one of those. In this case, however, Samael-who-would-become-Lucifer happened to enjoy a masculine corporation and the associated pronouns in his sporadic flirtations with a physical form, though he was certainly not adverse to other combinations. None of this is to say that some divine or occult beings do not have a preferred gender expression; Beelzebub has used 'they' pronouns for as long as they can remember and Michael will never stop being annoyed by the fact that her name has become associated with male children due to human assumptions about warriors and masculinity."

[2] No one in heaven ever thought about it, but these little stars planted in the rich soil of the distant nebulae were the first Eden, long before Earth was more than a twinkle in God's eye. "[return to text] 3"Fire alarm batteries and the infernal beeping they produce when nearing depletion are, in fact, literally infernal. Crowley was quite pleased with his work on them in the 1960s and utterly refused to be annoyed by one of his own creations."

* * *

A few notes about Angel names used in this chapter; We don't know the names of the fallen angels before they fell, if they had different names at all. Since GO fanon (and canon?) says that names are lost on Falling, I had to come up with their old names. Where possible, I used the oldest form of the demon mentioned in liturgical texts [Rahab/Leviathan; Beal/Berith], if that wasn't possible I used alternate translations for their names with the oldest possible Hebrew translation being the heavenly name and the most consistent Latin translations being the demonic name [Ashmedai/Asmodeus; Asteraoth/Astarot]. Finally, where there are no older translations (or where the older translations are offensive) I created an angelic name based on some feature of their pre-Fall identity [e.g. Beelzebub is associated with the morning star so I used the Greek name for Venus and the -ael ending]. Also, Ashtaroth is the demon of sloth, so I liked the idea of them tempting people away from work even as an angel. Also also, that means that Crowley is only following in their footsteps as Nanny Ashtoreth.


	8. On a Wing and a Prayer

A/N: We're finally to the scenes that inspired this entire story! Yay! I hope y'all enjoy 3 Just one more chapter and an epilogue after this.

**Chapter 8: On a Wing and a Prayer**

Though they would not like to admit it, one of the very many similarities between the agents of Heaven and Hell is their preferred method of conveyance. They both disdain the more 'human' modes of transport with the exception of when those methods will elicit the appropriate amounts of fear or awe (as was the case with flaming steeds and shining chariots). Instead they each prefer to travel by their own, innate methods.

For angels this is straightforwardly flight, though it often does not resemble what humans would conceptualize as flight. An angel is a pan-dimensional ethereal being who only rarely deigns to constrain a portion of their entirety into a physical form. When they travel across the Earth through the use of their wings, they slip slightly further away from the three-dimensional space and interact with the fabric of time itself in order to travel more rapidly. 1000 miles is far less arduous a journey with one can spread their wings, catch a temporal updraft, and allow the universe to reel beneath you until the appropriate spot arrives. Of course, they can also fly in a much more literal sense.

Hell is, as always, a more contrary affair. Unlike angels, who no matter their rank share certain core similarities, demons can be easily segregated into three categories quite distinct from their rank; the Fallen, the Lilim, and the Made[1]. There are only a small handful of true Fallen in Hell's ranks, only so many angels rebelled after all and its not like they were particularly keen to make more. Fallen demons travel in much the same way as their angelic counterparts, though they will be quick to point out that they do it with more style and better looking wings. Most of the demons clattering around the scorched circles are the children of Lilith, wholly demonic in every way and far divorced from their original human parentage. They, however, lack one feature the Fallen have; wings. So, they travel through other means, typically this means simply stepping out of Hell and arriving where they wish to be. Humans often experience the results of this type of travel as sudden sinkholes in the middle of the road or geysers where none previously existed.

When an angel or a demon has been on earth for sufficiently long periods of time they adapt. Or at least, the only two who have ever spent more than a few years on Earth consecutively have adapted. Crowley has always favored the speediest mortal method of transport available to him. Aziraphale has a very distinct memory of the two of them having run across each other in the course of business on a tiny Grecian island. Crowley, after determining that Aziraphale was not about to stop him, had happily stolen a slick little trireme and proceeded to whip up a rather violent storm in order to catch the winds and fly across the water[2]. Really, he was meant for the automobile era. Aziraphale had made do with horses, though it was unpleasant at best. When possible he simply flew the earth-bound way, with physical wings and an eye on the skies. He could not remember the last time he allowed the universe to shift around him in the traditional flight of an angel.

Until the night of November 2nd 2019 when the thought of the ten minutes it would take to cross the distance between the bookshop and Crowley's flat was utterly intolerable. He dropped the phone, the worry pounding in his ears deafening him to Anathema's tinny voice as she continued to chatter away. In the time it takes a human to blink he was outside and unfurling his wings. Without a second thought he allowed them to manifest not only in the physical realm but also in the next plane of existence up[3]. He shook out the stiff muscles (both physical and metaphysical) and spread his primaries. The worry churning in his gut made the edges of his feathers tremble and for a microsecond he was afraid they would be unworthy of carrying him.

Then, a ripple swept through the fabric of space and time, catching Aziraphale up and propelling him out and away from the physical realm. He watched as the world spun wildly beneath him, the chaotic dance of lives passing by and children running and lovers meeting for the first time and-

He slammed back to the Earth on the street outside Crowley's flat mere picoseconds after he left the bookshop. Ever so slightly disoriented, it had been a long time since he did that after all, he took a few moments to gather himself before looking at the building.

It was a good sign, he thought, that the building was still standing. If Hell was truly upset then he expected to find the area a ruin of brimstone and death. But, the building appeared sound. He drug his eyes up the achingly modern facade, searching for the penthouse windows. When he found them he could not help but breathe a sigh of relief. They were dark and still, no flickering light or smoke of a fire burning out of control. Perhaps Anathema's vision was just the product of her own worries. Aziraphale could go up and apologize to Crowley for crossing the invisible line of Crowley's privacy and maybe they could go for a late night sushi roll and make up.

Feeling much better, he approached the front door. The building had a state of the art security system but Aziraphale had never heard of it, so he was not aware that he was supposed to have difficulty getting in and simply opened the door. He made his way up the six flights of stairs as quickly as he could until he was finally (_finally_) standing before Crowley's door. Nearly two entire minutes had passed since his phone hit the desk in the bookshop.

He knocked.

No answer.

Were this situation reversed Crowley would not have knocked in the first place. But, Aziraphale felt that a bookshop and a flat were very different beasts and he'd already violated Crowley's privacy enough for one week.

He knocked again.

Nothing.

The faint smell of sulfur drifted through the sealed door and a cold bucket of reality fell over Aziraphale. Anathema was the descendant of the only human to ever be completely and totally prophetically accurate. Whyever would she be any different? If she said Crowley was in danger, then he was in danger and here Aziraphale was playing at being human instead of doing everything in his power to be at the demon's side. With a thought he shifted reality so ensure that the locks on Crowley's door were conveniently left unsecured. He opened the door.

As soon as the seal was breached a wall of smoke and heat hit him. The sulfur smell was so strong he nearly gagged as he waved his hands, trying to clear the air around at least his head. The foul smoke stubbornly clung to him, seeping into the pores of his corporation and latching on. He took a step into the flat and pulled the door shut behind him. The rest of the apartment building was unbothered by whatever was happening here and he intended for it to remain that way[4].

"Crowley?" He called into the dark flat. The smoke hung thick in the air and caught in his throat. He coughed twice and then turned off the corporation's need to breathe. It wasn't a permanent solution; he couldn't talk without taking a breath. But, it would allow him the clarity to search for his wayward demon.

"Crowley!" He called again with the last available air in his lungs. Silence.

He stopped moving and listened. Crowley clearly was not in the main room, the horrible grey velvet couch was empty and the record player was still and silent. The room was filled with noise however, now that he had stopped his own harsh breaths. Crackling, growing louder with each passing moment, and underneath that a voice speaking rapidly. He knew that voice at the very core of his being, a constant song woven around the spiral whorls of his true form; Crowley.

He darted across the space towards the back of the flat. As he moved the heat grew until it was a physical force pressing against him. He knew now with the unerring intuition that had led him to trust Crowley for the first time all those years ago which door he would find his demon behind. He turned to the left, towards the secret garden he'd discovered two nights ago.

He shoved it open without hesitation and immediately recoiled.

Hell. Every angelic instinct in him screamed that he should flee, find some water to bless and douse the entire room because that was Hellfire and it wanted to unmake him. He stood his ground, though it was a near thing. Instinctively, he tried to Miracle away the smoke that billowed from the room but it resisted his efforts with the same stubbornness Crowley resisted compliments.

Unable to step into the room for fear of being written out of existence, Aziraphale ducked below the smoke and took a deep breath.

"Crowley!" He tried once more. The demon was still talking, slurred words that tumbled from him and into the fire where they were burned to nothing before Aziraphale could understand what he was saying. With his vision less obstructed he could just barely make out the dark line of Crowley sprawled against the wall not two meters away. He hands ached to grab his lapels and pull him from the blaze but a single touch of Hellfire and...

Suddenly Crowley moved. It was hard to tell through the ash drifting through the air and the way it rippled in the heat, but it looked like he was lifting something to his face? Aziraphale's heart leapt into his throat. Unbidden, he recalled the moment Crowley slipped him a scrap of paper asking for Holy Water. Surely he wasn't about to- The demon's hand retreated to his side without incident and Aziraphale decided enough was enough.

He glanced up at the ceiling and clasped his hands together.

"Lord," he said, "I know I am not one of your more, ah, zealous servants." That was a bit of an understatement when all he really wanted in life was to sample the many, many restaurants of London with his demon at his side. But, he rationalized, of course She would know that. She knew his heart better than even he did.  
"I am not as proactive as I should be in spreading Your message, though I admit I'm not sure what message it is I would be spreading. It is after all-" He cut himself off before he could say 'ineffable' as Crowley had strictly banned the word in his presence (claiming that having used it to save the world it should now be retired entirely). "What I mean to say is, Please help me Lord. My, I mean, the demon Crowley is one of Your creations and he is hurting and I cannot reach him."

Nothing happened. He sighed and turned back to the room. Perhaps if he was very careful he could maneuver around the flames and reach Crowley without being set ablaze himself.

There was a very narrow path where it looked like a pot had shattered spilling soil onto the floor in a dark line. He took a deep breath, coughed, and stepped into the room. Tucking his arms as tightly as he could to his sides, he took one more step. The Hellfire blazed up as if it sensed the ancient enemy in its presence.

Tongues of excited electrons and infernal energy reached toward him. Flickering within centimeters of the back of his hand before retreating and collecting more for a second attempt. He flinched away from them violently.

He took another step, only a few more and he would be at Crowley's side. He could see more clearly now as the heat from the fire pushed the smoke higher and the draft from the rest of the apartment started to clear the air. Crowley was crumpled against the wall like a marionette with its strings singed away. Beside him was a bottle of indistinguishable origin, very nearly empty save for a single finger of black sludge at the bottom.

Another step. Before Aziraphale could react a thick brand of Hellfire whipped out away from the skeletal remnants of the hibiscus in the holy font and wrapped around his arm. He shouted, first in fear and then in agony as it ate into his corporation.

He looked at Crowley, wanting the last thing he saw to be his demon. His eyes lingered on the sharp slope of Crowley's nose, following it along to his lips. Aziraphale opened his mouth to say goodbye or thank you or something when he realized he still had a mouth. He was still extant. He should have been consumed by now, eaten out of existence by the very flames that had Felled so many. And yet... his arm hurt quite badly. He sniffed delicately.

The sulfur smell had vanished.

Without a moments' hesitation he snapped his uninjured fingers to dismiss the now very earthbound flames and smoke, leaving behind only the results of the blaze. Then, he collapsed to the floor beside Crowley.

"Thank you," he whispered, his voice hoarse with a heady mix of smoke inhalation, fear, and gratitude. "Thank you."

Despite the lack of windows in the room, a soft glow encased him and he allowed himself a moment to bask in it. They'd never had any kind of confirmation after preventing the apocalypse that that was truly God's plan. But, it was nice to know She did not want him unwritten from existence at the very least.

He took one more fortifying breath and turned back to his raison d'être. Crowley had not moved, but his heavily lidded eyes were open and staring at Aziraphale as if he were seeing a ghost. He'd stopped talking when the flames vanished.

"Azzraphl?" He asked.

Aziraphale forced his relief weakened muscles to move and shifted so he was seated directly in front of Crowley.

"Yes, my dear," he whispered. "Crowley, I need to know what happened? Was it Hell? Are they coming for you?" Hell trying to kill Crowley with Hellfire didn't make perfect sense, but Heaven certainly didn't have the means to produce the stuff. It crossed his mind that this might have been a trap for him, but before he could fully examine that thought Crowley spoke again.

"Noo," he slurred, "I bund, no, I bernned'm."

"What?" Aziraphale reached out and took the bottle from Crowley. He eyed the sludge suspiciously. "Darling, what in Heaven's name were you drinking?"

"Vrythin," Crowley sounded half pleased with himself half nauseous. His eyes drifted around the room, surveying the damage and for the first time Aziraphale did the same.

It was a total loss. Ever single plant and planter in the room had been ruined. All that remained were a few heartier twigs, scorched black and slowly crumbling to dust even as they watched. Aziraphale fought down the desire to hunt down whoever had done this. How unaccountably cruel, to destroy the plants Crowley so clearly cared for like this.

"I bernnd thm," Crowley said again, mournful and low and in a dizzying moment of revelation, Aziraphale understood.

There had been no other demons, no angels save himself. Crowley had done this. The demon who had never, in Aziraphale's memory at least, used Hellfire as a weapon had turned it on his own garden. He swallowed back bile.

"Dearest," he whispered, "Perhaps you wouldn't mind sobering up just a tad?"

It took a long minute, but Crowley managed to drag his eyes back to Aziraphale's. Aziraphale tried to project peace without actually using any of his angelic abilities. He worried that as fragile as Crowley was just then a brush with the Holy would undo him.

"Feryou, mkay." Crowley muttered. Then he closed his eyes and screwed up his face. Aziraphale watched as the bottle half filled with more sludge. He desperately did not want to know what it was. After a few moments Crowley reopened his eyes.

"Assiraphale?" he asked, "What're you doin here?"

Aziraphale heaved a sigh of relief at being able to understand Crowley.

"Our Anathema called me concerned about you." he said as pleasantly as he could manage, trying to put Crowley at ease with gentle patter, "It seems you were right and that she is taking after the departed Mistress Nutter."

Crowley did not respond. Instead he was looking around the room with a bleak look on his face that Aziraphale did not like at all.

"Are you injured?" He asked. Crowley shook his head. "That's good, that's very good. Oh, you have no idea how worried I was." Suddenly unable to contain himself Aziraphale stood and began pacing.

He had made one circuit of the room when he felt it. The pull of something ancient[5]. He turned away from Crowley for the first time to examine what he had felt. It was old, older than anything else Aziraphale had felt that wasn't of Heaven or Hell, and it pulled at his mind. He poked at one of the melted plastic pots, nudging it out of the way. There. On the countertop was a very familiar little clay pot, shattered by the heat of the fire and darkened by ash but still somehow known to him. He wracked his brain trying to think where he had seen it before.

"What is this, Crowley?" He asked.

Crowley looked up from where he appeared to be contemplating the relative merits of starting to drink again. he blinked slowly.

"What is this?" Aziraphale repeated.

All of a sudden there was life in Crowley again. He lurched to his feet and staggered across the space to snatch at shattered pot. Before he could, Aziraphale reached out and brush his fingers along the ragged edge. Touching the Font had helped him remember that terrible time in Romania, perhaps touching this He jerked back when a sharp corner pricked his finger. He watched, transfixed as it rolled across the fine etchings, coloring the clay crimson until there was nothing left. The etchings themselves were curious; Crowley was nothing if not a fan of the sort of minimalism Aziraphale himself avoided at all costs. Save the holy water font, none of the other pots had any sort of decoration. He looked closer and, despite the situation found a small smile curling the corner's of his lips. The little pot was decorated with tiny snakes slithering along the rim. He shook himself from the reverie to realize that Crowley did not appear to care for the pot at all, he was instead rooting through the scorched soil in wild-eyed desperation.

"Nonononono," he muttered, "I didn't mean it, I didn't-" He cut himself off as his fingers found something in the solid and lifted it free.

Aziraphale gasped. This was clearly the source of the ancient feeling. He reached out and wrapped his fingers around Crowley's wrist, staying his retreat. Startled by the contact, Crowley's fingers went limp, releasing the tiny object. Aziraphale caught it in his burned hand and shuddered at the sensation.

Entire lifetimes played out before his eyes. Growth, rebirth, a caring hand and desperate gaze. Whispered words of love and hatred and _need_ and more hope than Aziraphale thought a single being could possibly contain.

"My dear," Aziraphale breathed when he managed to wrench himself back to the present moment, "Do you have any idea what this is?" As soon as he said it he knew it was a silly question. Of course Crowley knew what it was. Every single cell of the seed's being sang with love for the demon. He reverently lifted the seed to eye level. "This is the most holy thing I have beheld since, well since my sword." That was an understatement, his sword was holy in the way angels themselves are holy; divinely endowed by their creator with a portion of the majesty of Heaven. This seed, it was something more than that. It felt holy in a self-made way. A slow accretion of growth and death and tender care and a being who never gave up on it and it was holy for that, not through divine intervention or intent.

Crowley shrugged. He very carefully pulled himself free from Aziraphale's grip and retreated back to the wall. With a clearly false veneer of calm he slid down it to where he had been sprawled before.

"It's great great times 457 grandmother came from the Garden. That's pretty damned holy I guess." His voice was a study in practiced nonchalance. He took a swig of the unidentifiable alcohol.

Aziraphale shook his head, "No, she didn't."

"Yes she did."

Aziraphale shook his head again and opened his mouth to explain but Crowley was suddenly on his feet again, his upper lip lifted in a snarl.

"Look, I know you don't think I'm good enough to hold something from there. But I did, I took it. Oh I guess that just makes sense though. Ruin Paradise for everyone and then steal something from it to boot. Just perfect Crowley! Way to-"

Shocked by the vitriol with which Crowley spoke about himself it took Aziraphale a scrambling moment to cut in.

"No, no!" he protested, "What I'm trying to say is that this IS the seed from the Garden. I don't know how, but this is the first seed to ever fall on Earth. You say you've been protecting it all these years?"

"What? No!" Crowley protested "I've been killing it. I killed it… so many times."

That- That didn't make any sense at all. If this were any other demon Aziraphale would think 'oh of course, they like killing so why not torment a plant for 6000 years', but, not only was this _Crowley_ who was not like that in the least, but the seed itself sang of care and affection. Nothing that had spent the last six millennia being murdered could still harmonize so beautifully with the universe itself.

"Why did you do that?" Oh that wasn't how he meant to ask that, he opened his mouth to correct himself but Crowley beat him to it.

"I didn't mean to!" he snarled, "I tried to keep it alive, but I think being near me poisoned it. Nothing I did worked." He worked his hands through his singed hair, yanking at the roots mercilessly.

Aziraphale's heart melted into the space at the base of his rib cage, filling his chest with liquid warmth. He set the seed down on the soil and stepped forward to gently guide Crowley's hands away from his head. Crowley tried to pull away, to retreat away from the open affection in Aziraphale's gaze, but the angel did not let go. Instead, he enveloped Crowley's hands within his own, covering them as completely as he could. This was not a hurt he could heal with Holy Light or a simple misunderstanding, he could see the whole shape of it now. This was the Fall and the loss of Eden and Crowley's own nature all wrapped up in a tangled, thorny mess. Crowley could not unwind the snare on his own because his hands were shredded and ragged from millennia of holding as tightly as he could to everything.

"Crowley," he murmured. "I want you to listen very carefully to me and please take every word I am about to say as the utter and complete truth."

Crowley stared at him, his eyes wide, narrow pupils blown to ovals in distress.

"You are not unworthy."

Crowley tried to look away, but Aziraphale lifted one hand and grasped his chin firmly.

"I do not know what led to your Fall and you never have to tell me if you don't want to, but I know you. Even before we were friends, I knew you were better than anyone else. From the very beginning, Crowley. You were kind to Eve, you saw her as her own person long before any of the rest of us thought of her as more than a spare rib given breath."

"And look what that got her!" Crowley's voice teetered at the edge of desperation, "A few days with me as a friend and I get her cast out and made mortal, forced to watch as her sons fought and died. For what? A few days of friendship from a no-name demon with who couldn't help her in the end?"

Oh. _Oh_. Aziraphale had no idea that Crowley had considered Eve a friend. IT made sense. He knew the woman wasn't reckless, she never would have eaten the fruit if she hadn't trusted the being who told her it was okay. But, Crowley had so few friends it was odd to think of another in that way. Really, Aziraphale could count on one hand the number of names he had heard mentioned more than once by the demon in over 6000 years. Dozens, if not hundreds of associates, enemies, superiors, coworkers, yes. But, few to a vanishing number of friends. He shifted his hand so it was cupping the side of Crowley's face and had to hide a satisfied smile when Crowley pressed his cheek in his palm, unconsciously leaning into the freely offered affection.

"That is not you fault," Aziraphale insisted when he was sure Crowley was paying attention again. "You gave her a choice, the First Choice. Without you nothing on Earth would be the same."

"That's the point!" Crowley said, "Nothing would be the same! There wouldn't be sin and they wouldn't die."

Aziraphale's heart hurt. "Would that be better?"

That seemed to stopper Crowley's racing thoughts, at least momentarily. He stared at Aziraphale. "What?" The word escaped him like an unwanted prayer.

"Would it be better if Earth were exactly like Heaven?" Crowley did not respond so Aziraphale pressed on. "Would it be better for humans to never touch each other, to always stand apart and cold? Would it be better if the only art and songs were to exalt Her glory? Creativity is not rewarded in Heaven, so would it have been better if Leonardo had never devised any of his inventions? If Murasaki never wrote the Tale? If children not only didn't play in the streets, but perhaps never existed in the first place? Is any of that really better, Crowley?"

Crowley could no longer meet his eyes and Aziraphale took pity on him. He shifted so that instead of kneeling before Crowley his was sitting beside him pressing the entire length of his left side against Crowley's right. They sat in silence for a long time. Slowly, the tension leaked from Crowley and he allowed more and more of his weight to rest against Aziraphale. He smiled down at the top of Crowley's singed hair. IT was clear that the demon had only managed their conversation as long as he had because his anxiety overrode the sheer volume of alcohol still swimming saturating his system. Now, he had reached the point at which he could no longer hold off rest no matter how unsettled his mind still was. It was not until Crowley was on the verge of sleep that Aziraphale realized they couldn't stay on the floor all night.

"Come on," he said. He slid his hands around Crowley's back and lifted him from the floor with a rather unangelic grunt. "Let's get you to bed." It was a pity, he thought, that Crowley had fallen asleep before Miracleing himself fully sober[6]. He was going to be very unhappy in the morning.

Once vertical it was a simple matter of maneuvering their way across the short hallway between the kitchen and bedroom. The door swung open as they approached and Aziraphale deposited Crowley in his bed. The demon mumbled something unintelligible and shifted restlessly. Aziraphale pulled the silken sheets up to the Crowley's chin. He brushed the scorched fringe of hair up from his forehead, allowing the very tips of his fingers to linger against heated skin before sighing and stepping away.

"Sleep well, dearest," he said. He pulled the door shut and took three rapid steps away before allowing himself to breathe again. Huge gusts of air ripped in and out of his lungs, he might not technically need air the way a human did, but just then he felt he wasn't getting nearly enough of it. How had he missed this for so many years? Crowley's very being was a festering wound and Aziraphale had no clue where to begin healing it. He clenched his fists, the pain in his burned hand screaming back into being. He'd forgotten it in the face of Crowley's distress.

What he wanted more than in anything in that moment was a good long, face-to-face chat with God. He wanted to ask Her why? Why test one of Her children so very cruelly? Why allow it to go on for so long? Had Crowley not proven himself worthy long ago? What crime had he committed in Heaven that was so terrible he was still being tormented in this way eons later?[7]

Eventually, he managed to shove these doubts and questions (and no small measure of righteous fury) back into the very small space he allowed himself for those sorts of feelings. Now was not the time for his own breakdown. Crowley needed him. He could fall to pieces later when he was safely ensconced in his bookshop and he knew that Crowley was safe and whole. He stood from where he had leaned against the wall, walked into the destroyed kitchen-slash-garden, and contemplated his options.

Most important of all, he knew, was the seed. He scooped the remains of the ancient pot and seed into his hands, careful to avoid the jagged edges.

Then, he asked one more question. This time it was not directed Above. Instead, he focused all the entirety of his being on the little seed in the palm of his hand. _What do you need?_ he wanted to know, _Why wasn't what Crowley did enough?_

The brief flashes of history he'd seen before were nothing on what the seed showed him now. With the weight of angelic power behind it, the seed's gentle melody became an orchestra. Light, it thrilled out, high pitched and clear. Warmth, echoed back from the depths. Space, intoned in a wild vibrato, pulsing through the entire song. The single dissonant note spoke of floods and trickles and drips and rain and being watered every day by a hand that did not know any better. The main melody, woven through the others in rich notes that made him think of deserts and dry breezes and ancient places, told him it needed love.

"I think," he said with a smile, "We can manage all that for you."

* * *

[1] The Made demons do not leave hell. They are of hell and cannot exist outside of it and so they shall be disregarded with respect to demonic modes of transportation.

[2] Aziraphale's memory involves quite a bit less about the boat itself and quite a bit more about the wild grin, free and unfettered, that Crowley had favored him with as he sailed away.

[3] Aziraphale did not have to concern himself with the casual glances of passersby for two reasons; first, angel wings are endowed with unconscious miracle work to ensure that only the most devout humans can even perceive them, and second, this was SoHo on a Friday night.

[4] Crowley would never admit it, but he was openly fond of the toddler on the third floor and was dearly protective of his ongoing feud with Mrs. Nesbalm in the flat directly below his. Aziraphale had never quite got the hang of inter-flat relations.

[5] Aziraphale was well attuned to the feeling of an ancient item in the modern times, his bookshop was full of them; little tomes whose timelines were at odds with the world around them. He loved feeling like he was surrounded by shards of history, as if his shop was a stained glass window, if only one could step outside of reality and look in. The only other being in London who could do that quite liked looking at his shop

[6] It was a further pity that he was too out of it to make the appropriate noises about temptation Aziraphale knew he would when given an opening such as 'let's get you to bed'. Likely complete with waggling eyebrows and an inability to do more than blush if Aziraphale so much as smiled at him after that. Aziraphale loved Crowley, he really did, but the poor demon was so easily flustered.

[7] He would not know it for many, many years, but these were exactly the sort of questions that had led Crowley to the situation he currently found himself in. Luckily for Aziraphale, God had mellowed over the years and was, in fact, often a little embarrassed by the reactionary, vengeful God role She had played in those days. Aziraphale would not Fall for asking questions.


	9. An Emotional HangoverInterfering Angel

A/N: Whew. This chapter fought me. It had grown to nearly 7000 words, so I ended up splitting it. One half now and one in a few days.

So, I want to preface Crowley's POV. If you aren't someone who deals with anxiety, his moods might seem a little odd here. I'm trying to stay true to things as I know them, so essentially, there's a moment when you've had an anxiety /thing/ when it's over and your brain is a little more logical and suddenly you feel ridiculous for reacting so strongly to something so simple. But, you're still not okay and so you have this fun up and down of all those anxious thoughts rushing back and then feeling okay for a minute (and repeat) and just generally being exhausted by it all. So, yeah. That's what I'm going for here.

As always, thank y'all so much for your comments! They absolutely make my week. Y'all're amazing.

**Chapter 9: An Emotional Hangover Meets an Oversharing Angel**

Crowley awoke to the sun streaming in through his windows and the dull ache suffusing his entire being that one can only feel after experiencing emotions too intense for words. He lay in his bed, carefully poking at the tangle in his heart, trying to see if it was still explosive. He felt vaguely as if he wanted to scream, but the ability to do was bottled up by the lassitude brought on by silk sheets and warm sunshine[1] . It occurred to him that he was quite unsure of how exactly he came to be in his bed and how long he had spent there. He knew with the same instinct that told him when precisely to walk into a church filled with Nazis or appear in a French jail cell that more than a few hours had passed. The angle of the sun told him it was fairly early in the morning, but he had no idea what day it was.

The tentative idea that he should get up had just flickered into existence when he realized the gentle murmuring he had been hearing since he awoke was not the television. He eyes snapped open and he had scrambled to a semi-vertical position before he realized exactly what he was hearing. Aziraphale. With a thought he forced his pointless heart back into a normal rhythm and collapsed back into the tangle of limbs he was accustomed to sleeping in. Aziraphale would never be a cause for concern, no matter how little Crowley currently felt like talking to anyone[2].

"Oh no, this evening is fine, I just want to take him there alone first." Aziraphale was saying to someone. Crowley could not sense anyone else around, so he must be on the phone. Knowing he had a few moments before Aziraphale might check in on him, Crowley attempted to wrangle his racing thoughts into some kind of order.

It really probably wasn't as bad as he thought. He'd only... burned up half his garden in hellfire while getting terrifically, awe-inspiringly drunk and saying Satan only knows what to his best friend. Okay. So, it wasn't _great. _He took a ragged breath.

Really, he felt almost ridiculous. Oh, he was sure whatever he'd said was the truth. He tended towards being an honest, if emotional, drunk[3]. But, here, in the warm light of morning it all felt very distant. Yes, he was the reason for all of human suffering, and yes, he was clearly too poisonous to allow anything truly good to thrive in his presence. But, he'd known all that for the last 6000 years, there was no reason to be throwing a fit now. He should get up and go tell Aziraphale that it was all a big misunderstanding and invite him to that genuinely terrible production of Hamlet being put on by the Mayfair community theater he'd heard so much about.

He took a deep breath, and then another, and then a third before he realized he was being a coward. He might know he had been ridiculous, but he'd very rarely been so openly emotional in front of Aziraphale and he was irrationally afraid of what the angel would say. What if, oh Satan, what if he wanted to _talk _about it? Crowley shuddered. Maybe he could just stay here in this lovely sunspot, warm and alone until Aziraphale left?

"Yes," Aziraphale said from the other room. Crowley could hear the smile in his voice. Despite the emotions still roiling about his own head, hearing Aziraphale smiling made him want to smile as well. He didn't, but the desire helped him to wrangle a few more rebellious thoughts into alignment. "Oh of course, we'll be sure to bring it with us. You're a dear. Yes. Thank you. Until later."

Laying there, listening to Aziraphale speak so pleasantly soothed something in Crowley. The light pouring into the room seemed warmer now and he stretched without thinking about it. Then, he winced. If his soul was sore it had nothing on his corporation which protested mightily against the amount of alcohol he had consumed and then neglected to miracle away. With a thought he banished the pounding headache but allowed the more minor muscle aches to remain. Sore limbs helped to ground him, to remind him that it had all happened.

Shifting had released the stench of ash and char from his clothes and the desire to smile fled entirely. He killed his plants, burned them to nothing more than ash. A sharp pang of grief ripped through him. Those plants were depending on him, it wasn't their fault he was, well, the way he was. Unbidden, the image of a spark of hellfire alighting on the edge of a verdant leaf entered his mind. He watched as it sat for the briefest of moments and, even though this was a memory and he knew how it all played out, wished for the moisture in the leaf to overwhelm the heat in the spark. Then, the spark caught and the leaf burned, fire traveled along it, leaving behind first skeletal remnants of cellulose and then nothing at all. He choked back the noise that wanted to escape his throat. It wasn't a sob or a shout, it was something far deeper, something for his true form that this human corporation could not begin to produce.

Crowley struggled to remember what happened after the fire caught. He knew Aziraphale had been there. Though the night felt almost dreamlike, he could still feel the cool, dry rasp of Aziraphale's hands against his own. But he had no memory of what they discussed or what happened after the angel arrived. He assumed that Aziraphale had done away with the hellfire somehow, he had to have since he was sitting in the next room chatting away. Crowley knew that. Logically. But, now the spark was landing on Aziraphale's arm instead of a leaf and burning away first his corporation and then his everything and-

Crowley forced the thoughts away.

Suddenly filled with the need to see the angel, Crowley slid from the bed, twisting his joins as he went to pop them back into a mostly humanoid alignment. He scrubbed on hand across his face and then through his hair. Dried sweat and ash made it stand up wildly but he couldn't be bothered to spare the miracle to straighten it just then.

"Azssiraphale!" He called as he stepped out of the bedroom, "About last night-"

Aziraphale looked up from the book he was reading. Crowley's phone was at his side, clearly whoever he'd been talking to was on the other end. Good. Crowley could check the call history when he was alone again. He raked his eyes across the angel, searching for any evidence that he'd run afoul of the hellfire. He appeared whole and another piece of Crowley slotted back into place. He released a breath he hadn't even been aware he was holding.

"Crowley!" Aziraphale's face folded into a wide smile. "You're awake. Good. I worried you'd sleep the decade away again. Now, come along. We have a bit of a drive ahead of us."

"What?" All of his half-thought protests about the night before fell away in the face of Aziraphale's sunny bustle. The angel stood from his seat and grasped Crowley's elbow with one hand.

"I have a surprise for you, dear." He was pulling Crowley along now, gently but inexorably towards the door.

"What?" None of this was going the way he thought it should. Aziraphale was supposed to have thought things through and realized that Crowley was right and maybe they should take some time apart. Which was not what Crowley wanted in the slightest, but it made sense. For all that they had told Heaven and Hell to eat it, there were some incontrovertible fact about angels and demons that just couldn't be avoided and Crowley expected Aziraphale to have realized that after-

Aziraphale was suddenly in his space, looking concerned and Crolwey realized he planted his feet at the edge of the living room. Aziraphale's hand was still on his elbow. Crowley could feel the heat of it even through his jacket and shirt.

"Are you alright, Crowley?" Aziraphale asked. He lifted his other hand and seemed about to put it on Crowley's forehead before thinking better of the action and lowering it again. "We don't have to go today if you're still feeling under the weather."

It was suddenly the most important thing in the world that Crowley not disappoint Aziraphale. He forced his scattered thoughts into something resembling order and sketched a smile he did not feel.

"I'm fine, angel," he snapped, unable to fully control his voice. Aziraphale still looked unsure, so Crowley pulled his arm free and stalked across the remaining distance to the doorway. He realized as they descended the stairs that he was clearly still more affected by the events of the previous night than he had thought. It was quite unlike him to be so up and down; happy in the sunshine one moment, dreading even moving the next, ecstatic to see Aziraphale, annoyed at his concern. It was all very disorienting.

After a brief silence, Aziraphale kept up a cheerful stream of patter as they made their way to the Bentley. Once inside, Crowley glanced at the ignition, sending it roaring to life and pulled away from the curb.

"Where are we going?" he asked.

"I thought a visit out to see Adam and Miss Anathema would be nice." For the first time since he emerged from his room, Crowley could see that Aziraphale looked nervous.

"Okay," he drug out the word. "Am I allowed to ask why?" It wasn't that they didn't pop by Tadfield[4], but it seemed like an odd choice given the vents of the previous night.

Aziraphale's hand was back on his arm. "No," he said, "It's a surprise and I don't want to spoil it." There was tension around Aziraphale's eyes now and Crowley hated to see that, so he let the topic drop.

The drive passed without further incident. Crowley felt himself relaxing as the Bentley moved further from the destruction of his garden. The smooth sounds of a brand new Beethoven tape slowly shifted towards Freddie as they crossed the M25 and Crowley caught Aziraphale mouthing the words to a few of the songs.

When they reached the edge of Tadfield, Crowley started to turn off the main road towards the little side street that would lead to Anathema's cottage, but Aziraphale shook his head.

"No, it's up ahead further. Take the turn off for Eden Park." Crowley raised one eyebrow and Aziraphale chuckled. "Yes, the name is rather apropos."

The last few minutes were filled with silence broken only by Aziraphale murmuring directions as they approached their destination. Crowley was starting to get nervous. Normally a surprise from Aziraphale meant he'd actually bought tickets for that night instead of Miracling them. This was all very odd.

"Just here," Aziraphale finally said. He pointed to a small gravel pull out. Crowley parked.

"Why are we here, angel?" he asked.

"Come on, it's right up ahead."

"_What _isss?" he was starting to get frustrated. He still ached all over and really he just wanted to be curled up in bed with an unending bottle of wine.

Aziraphale was no longer meeting his gaze. "One moment," he said. There was something in his voice that made Crowley think of the bandstand. It was not a good memory. The angel led him away from the car and onto a thin dirt path through the thick copse of trees that lined the road along here. The path wound around for short ways before opening back up to reveal a wide vista of rolling hills dotted by low trees. The sun, just reaching its peak, lit the gently swaying grasses, turning them to green-gold waves. Despite his determination to be annoyed, Crowley's steps stuttered at the sudden view.

"It's lovely," he said dryly. "Why are we here?" He turned back to Aziraphale, who had stopped at the edge of the trees.

"This." Aziraphale gestured to his left. Crowley stared.

There was a greenhouse.

An entire _greenhouse _nestled between the trees at the edge of the wood, looking out over the hills. The glass shone in the sun held by delicate wrought iron worked into organic designs. He spied coiled snakes framing plain stained glass panels.

"What is that?" he managed to ask. He looked back at Aziraphale who looked suddenly unsure.

"Ah, a greenhouse?" he said. "It's just, well, you were so upset last night and you- well, you-"

"Killed my plantss? Why would that mean I dessserve thiss?" The confusing roller coaster of emotions he'd been rising since waking up surged forward again. This wasn't, he didn't, why would Aziraphale do this?

Aziraphale took a shuddering breath, clearly steeling himself for what he wanted to say.

"Crowley, dear," he began, his voice trembling ever so slightly, "I don't think you understand exactly what you mean to me."

"Az-"

Aziraphale cut him off, as if he hadn't started speaking at all. "I love you, Crowley. More than I thought was possible. I do not expect you to say anything in return, in fact, I would rather you not just now."

It was awfully bold of him, Crowley thought distantly, to presume that Crowley was going to be capable of any sort of speech after that little pronouncement.

"You are a singular being," Aziraphale continued. He had stepped away from the trees now and took Crowley's hand with one of his own. "There is nothing about you I would change." His grip on Crowley's hand tightened. "Nothing. You are a demon, you entice people to sin, myself included I should think. And I think that's a good thing."

"What?" Crowley managed.

"I asked you last night if you thought Earth would be better if it was like Heaven. Do you remember that?"

Crowley thought back, desperately wringing out his alcohol soaked brain for some hint of the conversation they'd had. It was surely ground breaking if it lead to Aziraphale saying, admitting he, oh stars. _He loved him_. His mind kept looping back on those words.

"It doesn't matter," Aziraphale said after a minute, when it became clear Crowley wasn't going to respond. "What I meant to ask was this; would you be happy if Earth was like Heaven?"

Crowley swallowed. He thought of Heaven before the Fall; of the easy camaraderie of Samael and his chosen few, of light suffusing everything around him, of endless Grace, of never being touched, of constantly wondering and being afraid to ask. He looked down at their joined hands.

"No," he said, "I don't think I would be."

Aziraphale beamed at him. "Then, that's all that matters, dear."

"I don't understand." He really didn't. None of this was what he was expecting when he woke up. He felt like he'd fast forwarded to the last scene of a film he'd never seen before.

"I can never be sad that you tempted Eve," Aziraphale said, "Because, you were right. If you hadn't done that the entire world would be different. They might not die and there probably wouldn't be sin or temptation or any of it."

"How is that not better?" Crowley knew he sounded desperate, but he needed to understand. It felt like the only important thing in the world just then.

"You wouldn't be happy if the world was like that," Aziraphale said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, "And if you weren't happy then I couldn't be happy."

"But," Crowley started to say before trailing off. He had no response to that. He raked his gaze across Aziraphale's face, looking for any hint of what he was supposed to do now. The angel's cheeks were slightly flushed and the sun glinted off the slight sheen of sweat on his forehead. Crowley swallowed.

"Would you like to know something else?" Aziraphale said. A smile was curling the corners of his mouth. It was the same one he wore when the waiter brought two slices of pie and Crowley immediately pushed his over. Tiny and fond and oh, oh, Aziraphale _loved_ him.

"What?"

Aziraphale held up his free hand, revealing a mottled mess of burned flesh. Crowley choked.

"Angel, what the fuck?" He snatched up the hand and immediately set about Miracling away the damage. After a moment of concentrated effort new pink skin started to creep across the ruined areas. Crowley looked up, furious that Aziraphale hadn't told him he was injured.

"Do you know what caused that burn?" Aziraphale asked before he could speak.

"I'm going to guessss fire," he hissed. Aziraphale laughed.

"You would be correct." He took his newly healed hand and intertwined the fingers with Crowley's. "You were burning your plants and I couldn't get to you. I couldn't even see you through the smoke and Hellfire and the only way I know to get rid of Hellfire is holy water. Which I obviously couldn't use."

Aziraphale in a burning room, a burning bookshop, burning up. Crowley's knees felt weak. They'd never talked about those terrible hours when he thought Aziraphale lost- No, when he'd thought he lost Aziraphale. Aziraphale seemed to sense his distress, because he paused and leaned his shoulder into Crowley's side, letting his warm weight act as reassurance.

"I was afraid for you," he said softly, "So I asked God for help. I told Her you were in trouble and I couldn't get to you. Then I walked into the room and moved too slowly and got burned."

"How is this supposed to make me feel anywhere close to okay, angel?" Crowley half-pleaded.

"Don't you understand? She wanted me to save you so She made it safe for me."

That, that was too much. Crowley couldn't handle the idea that God might not hate- might actually still lo- He couldn't. Not right now.

Aziraphale seemed to sense this because he stepped away, pulling Crowley towards the greenhouse.

"Come," he said softly. Crowley followed.

The greenhouse was mostly empty and relatively small, no larger than the living room in his flat. The ground was covered in large, flat paving stones and there were stacks of empty clay pots around the borders of the space. He looked around in wonder, his mind already jumping how to arrange pots to ensure everyone got the light they needed. Then, he looked at the centerpiece of the space.

Crowley swallowed roughly, his fingers tightening compulsively around Aziraphale's.

It was a sized-up version of the one he had bought on the streets of Memphis so long ago; rust red with little white snakes etched into the rim. He remembered now, through the haze of alcohol, that he had broken the original in his rage. This planter was filled with what looked like a mix of sand and soil.

"You cared for it for so long," Aziraphale told him, leaning closer once more and allowing his free hand to brush Crowley's elbow as he spoke. "It didn't seem right for it to grow in anything else." He pressed a small linen sachet into Crowley's hand. Crowley stared at it. Numbly, he pulled on the string tie and dumped the contents into his palm.

The seed. The edges were ever so slightly singed from his rampage, but the core was still the creamy, pale green of new life. He was suddenly gasping for air that wouldn't come.

Aziraphale's light touch shifted from acknowledgement to support. Crowley leaned into it.

"You do not have to plant it again," Aziraphale said. "You never have to plant it again if you don't want to."

Crowley looked up from the seed and into Aziraphale's eyes. The corners were crinkled in a slight smile.

"I promise," the angel said, "I _promise _that it will grow this time. It wasn't you dear."

Crowley choked on another unnecessary breath.

"It was not you." Aziraphale's voice was firm. "Or," and here he looked away and laughed a little, "It was you a little. But, not because of any terrible thing you're thinking."

"What?" Crowley croaked.

"It's a desert plant, dear," Aziraphale said. He sounded a little like he wanted to laugh and a little like he wanted to cry and Crowley was right there with him because-

"I've," he muttered, "I've been drowning it for 3000 years?"

Aziraphale's hand came up to pat the side of his face. "You were trying too hard to take care of it. I think it'll forgive you."

It was an absurd thought. Ridiculous. He'd been so careful to water it every day. Every morning without fail. And apparently, that care had been the death of it. A noise escaped him and Aziraphale's hand pat him again.

"I don't want to rush your decision," the angel said, "But, we'll have guests in a just a-"

Crowley stepped forward in a haze. The seed was in his hand and, for the first time in a long time, he realized he felt hopeful. Maybe this time it would grow, maybe this time he wouldn't fail. Because surely, with this much human and angelic goodness around it, his own demonic qualities wouldn't be strong enough to poison it?

He pressed the seed into the soil. Dead center and as far down as his index finger could reach. Then, he stood and stared.

After a minute Aziraphale joined him. "I admit," he said, "I do not know much about plants. But, I think they take a bit longer to grow than this."

"I thought it needed water," Crowley said. A sound halfway between a laugh and a shout clawed its way from him. "Plants need water."

Aziraphale smiled at him. "I think plants need all sorts of different things," he said in a way that made Crowley think he wasn't talking about only plants any more. "Sometimes they need water, and sometimes they need light, and sometimes all they need is time to grow on their own."

* * *

(So, one half of this idiot sandwich has said some things. Now about that other half...)

[1] Crowley had been careful to never reveal how very content this sort of gentle warmth made him. It was a weakness Hell would use and Crowley could not abide something he enjoyed so much being used against him.

[2] This was, perhaps, because Crowley did not and had not for many centuries, considered Aziraphale to be 'anyone'. The angel was, more accurately, the only one. But even that failed to describe the depths to which Crowley had intertwined Aziraphale around his soul. What Aziraphale meant to Crowley might best be summed up by saying this; Crowley, a demon of unlimited imagination, was unable to even begin to conceptualize a world where he existed and Aziraphale did not. If asked by a human, however, Crowley would say that Aziraphale was the Dorothy to his Blanche.

[3] A fact that at least one member of the angelic host found charming, though he was often not in a position to fully appreciate it, being rather drunk himself.

[4] As previously stated, they had visited twice in as many months. Relatedly, Crowley had also managed to visit the boarding school where young Warlock had been sent when the new term began in September no less than three times. Aziraphale was not fond of Warlock, but Crowley was his nanny and loved him dearly. The boy had been overjoyed to see Nanny Ashtoreth waiting for him on visitors day and confided in her that he really hadn't expected anyone to come. Nanny Asthoreth had given him a thin sort of smile, rested her hand atop his head, and promised to be back with a new book for them to read together next visitors day.


	10. An Ill-Favored Thing, But Mine Own

A/N: We're so close now! There's still an epilogue after this, but that chapter count won't be increasing again 3

(I admit I'm wildly nervous about this chapter, I'm solidly a genficcer so overt romance is pretty far outside my comfort zone. Suggestions/notes are always welcomed!)

Title from 'As You Like It' (WillyShakes)

**Chapter 10: An Ill-Favored Thing, But Mine Own**

There is an ancient history of hereditary enemies finding a good sturdy log to sit upon and put old differences aside. In the year 3976 BC Cain and Abel, the first humans to be born in the Universe, found a fallen olive tree and tried to hash things out. They were able to come to an understanding that would grant Abel another three years of life before Cain killed him in his sleep. They were a lovely three years. Nearly three thousand years later, two warriors for the Shang and Zhou dynasties respectively found themselves resting upon a dove tree felled in a recent storm. They promised to kill each other soon, after taking a moment to catch their breath. Then, the Shang warrior pulled out a small sachet of dried berries and the Zhou warrior produced some dried meat and they decided that there had been enough killing to suit them[1]. At the edge of Caesar's conquest, a Roman centurion and a Briton found common ground upon the bark of an ash tree. Before the sun crossed its zenith, the Briton was laughing at the Roman's poor attempt to speak Old Brythonic. In the American West, a cowboy and a cattle rustler told dirty jokes seated upon a cottonwood.

And, just now, an angel and a demon sat upon the trunk of an alder, watching the sun slowly cross the sky in silence. Of course, this particular angel and demon had not been enemies for a great many years[2] but the principle stands. Logs are good for bringing people together.

Aziraphale was watching a rather rotund bumblebee bounce its way along between the wildflowers with a small smile on his face. He was just beginning to get peckish and was excited about the prospect of dinner at the little pub just around the corner from the Young cottage. Crowley was watching Aziraphale with a look that, had Aziraphale been glanced over, would have revealed a great many thoughts Crowley was reluctant to voice. Crowley was rather grateful for the silence and the determined way Aziraphale was not looking at him. It gave him much needed distance from the revelations of the previous hour.

Aziraphale loved him.

The seed wasn't dead. Crowley hadn't been poisoning it.

Aziraphale loved him.

God didn't- God still- Well, he still wasn't quite sure what to think about this one. And he wasn't taking the time to think about it just now because-

_Aziraphale loved him. _

Before he could stop himself or second guess it, Crowley reached over and grasped Aziraphale's hand in his own. He had intended on it being a chaste gesture, simply cupping the angel's palm with his own, but Aziraphale twisted his hand and intertwined their fingers before Crowley realized what was happening.

"Aziraphale," Crowley rasped out. His voice was hoarse, throat still ragged from breathing in smoke and ash and trying very, very hard not to just start screaming and never stop. The desire to scream had faded even as he pressed the seed into the soil, but he still felt as if he were balanced on a razor's edge and could topple at the slightest provocation[3].

"Yes, dear?" Aziraphale asked when it became clearly Crowley was not about to continue on his own.

"I, uh, what I mean to say is-" At that moment, the Them burst through the foliage in a stream of muddy bikes and childish laughter and Crowley shut his mouth. Aziraphale squeezed his hand and Crowley, for the first time, allowed himself the luxury of not only squeezing back, but gently rubbing his thumb along the outside of Aziraphale's.

The children rolled to a raucous stop. Pepper was proudly in front of the others, panting with the effort of having beat them across the imaginary finish line that hovers before every group of children on bicycles. Brian and Wensleydale were bickering back and forth about a possibly illegal shortcut Brian had taken a few turns back and Adam was looking directly at Aziraphale and Crowley's hands.

The Anti-Christ gave them a wild and knowing grin. Crowley arranged his face in the closest approximation of 'I am a demon who could kill you in a heartbeat' he could manage to show a child. Adam's grin widened and he opened his mouth.

"Where are the chalks?" Brian piped up before Adam could say anything.

"Here," Adam said. He reached down and, to Crowley's mild horror, pulled a large packet of sidewalk chalk from a small polka-dotted backpack the Hellhound now known as Dog wore.

"You put a backpack on a Hellhound?" he asked as they walked towards the greenhouse. It was absurd. It was insane. Dog was from a long line of king-killers and war dogs and here he was, strapped in and panting with his stubby little tail wagging as fast as he could manage. Oddly, Crowley realized he could relate to the beast.

"I'm going to draw a dragon!" Wensleydale declared upon seeing the wide expanse of empty flagstones. He snatched up the two shades of green and, after a moment's thought turned to Pepper. "You could draw a princess in her tower?" He suggested. Pepper's brow lowered.

"Oh dear," Aziraphale whispered.

"We decided yesterday that I'm the King," Pepper said. She reached out and took the brighter green from Wensleydale, "I won the joust. That means you draw what I want you to draw."

"Yes, your majesty!" The boys chorused.

"Good! Now, I want a dragon and a knight. A girl knight! And a castle with a moat." The boys fell to work in a clamor of limbs and giggling. Aziraphale took one look at the stern expression on Pepper's face and nudged Crowley.

"I think you should draw her something, dear," he whispered, "You don't want to anger the King."

Crowley looked between the children, the brightly colored chalks, and his dark clothes.

"Oh, Crowley," Aziraphale said with a fond smile, "They're ruined. I didn't want to say anything, but you smell rather awful and I don't think even a miracle will remove that ash."

"Oh," Crowley said. He looked at the children. Wensleydale was sketching the outline of a knight on her horse while Brian tried to figure out just how many legs a dragon should have. Adam looked up with an expression that said, 'you don't _have_ to if you don't want to, but it would make us really happy if you wanted to' and Crowley was lost. There was a sharp moment of dissonance; these were pure beings desperately asking a demon to sit on the ground and draw with them. Aziraphale nudged him and he shook himself from the thoughts.

"I expect you'll never mention this to Hastur," he muttered as he removed his jacket and draped it on the log. Aziraphale's smile was blinding.

"I wouldn't dare."

Despite his pleas, Adam immediately took Crowley's place on the log and started telling Aziraphale about some book he'd been reading on Anathema's recommendation. Their chatter faded into the background and suddenly Crowley realized the tangle in his chest hurt less. It was still there. But, it felt like the thorns were less blunt, they didn't tear quite as readily. The gentle ebb and flow of children bickering and the soft murmur of his angel's laughter soothed him until he found he could breath, really truly breathe for the first time since he saw Aziraphale standing in the kitchen-garden.

"That's not a very good castle," Pepper said peeking over his shoulder. He looked at his drawing. It was a sketch of the castle he'd been using as the Black Knight.

"Actually, it looks rather good to me."

"Nuh-uh." And they were off. Crowley watched them fondly. When defending his affection for children in Hell, Crowley had been known to say that he tolerated children because they were vectors for sin, causing strife without even trying. But, the truth was he liked how low stakes everything was with kids. They could argue and complain now and in five minutes they would have forgotten why they were even mad. It was refreshing for a being whose entire existence was defined by his parent's inability to forgive his faults.

Anathema and Newt arrived around half an hour after the Them. Crowley took one look at them, and decided a strategic retreat was the best course of action. The Them were all well and good, but his still fragile walls were not up for socializing with the witch and her inept roommate. So, he moved across the gently sloping field to the edge of the treeline. He could still see and hear the activity around the little greenhouse but he was far enough away that he should be safe from being pulled into random conversations.

It was pleasant, he mused, watching them all. Anathema and Newt had set down the bags they brought with them and Anathema was happily pulling out a rather alarming number of supplies that looked witchy in nature. Aziraphale stood beside her and even from across the field Crowley could hear him excitedly discussing the wards they were going to be drawing. Newt watched the pair for a moment before Pepper appeared at his side looking imperious and expectant. She said something Crowley could not hear and then the two of them were gathering up Newt's bag and all the still empty clay pots they could carry and moving onto the grass. Once settled, Newt produced a set of paints and brushes and the two fell upon the blank pots with palpable glee. Crowley dreaded to see what sort of brightly colored monstrosities his poor plants were going to be obliged to grow in[4]. Wensleydale and Brian had achieved a level of grime that was truly staggering given how little time they'd been sitting on the ground. Even as he watched, Wensleydale reached up and scratched his nose, leaving behind a large smear of red chalk. Adam was... Crowley looked around. Where had the boy gone?

Dog, Crowley still thought the name was terrifically clever, was watching Aziraphale and Anathema with an assessing gaze that could only mean he was contemplating correcting some portion of their wards. The little beast was typically not terribly far away from his-

"Hullo," Adam tossed himself down on the grass beside Crowley.

"Evening," Crowley greeted. He settled back on his elbows with his legs stretched out in front of him, the picture of carefully affected ease, and peered over the rim of his glasses at Adam. "Shouldn't you be over there making a mess and being human?"

Adam watched his friends for a few minutes before responding. "I know I'm a human," he said, "But sometimes I think they're a bit much. I guess that's my Father's influence, huh?"

Crowley thought about it. After the Fall he'd done everything in his power to avoid Satan, so he wasn't quite sure what the devil was like now-a-days in a social setting. But, Before, when they had still been angels, Samael had been social and friendly.

"I'm sorry to say that's probably just you being a little too British for your own good," he said. "From what I remember, the Devil is a pretty gregarious guy."

Adam scrunched his nose up. "That's weird," he said.

Crowley chuckled, "Weirder than all this?" He gestured to the scene before them. "That's a witch and an angel painting protection sigils on a greenhouse meant to house the first ever seed that ever fell to Earth and which has been repeatedly dying for the 3000 years because I'm a bleeding moron."

Adam huffed out a little breath. "Well, when you put it that way," he muttered. Then, he looked up at Crowley with an all too knowing gaze. "Are you okay?" he asked.

"Course." Crowley said as casually as he could manage. He was glad to have buried his hands in the grass where their sudden shaking was hidden.

"Okay," Adam said. Then, after a short pause, "Only I keep thinking I hear you saying something and when I look at you you're not speaking."

Well, that was an interesting new manifestation of inhuman abilities.

"What am I saying?" Crowley asked. "Not now, obviously, when I talk without talking."

Adam pulled his knees up and wrapped his arms around them. He'd had a growth spurt these last few weeks and his knees looked especially knobbly just then.

"You keep saying _why_," Adam said very quietly, "That's one of the only words I can understand. _Why _and sometimes _please._"

It was a kick in the gut. Adam wasn't hearing his thoughts or anything expected like that. He'd somehow tapped into the very core of Crowley's being where the question he'd Fallen for was written in the sulfur. _Whywhywhywhywhy _in a constant refrain, glowing caustic and foul through even the most divine moments in his life.

"Ah," Crowley said evenly. "Well, it's nothing to worry about. We did tell you your powers were going to keep getting stronger."

Adam nodded. He tugged his legs in tighter.

"Yeah," he said, "It's just-" He looked up at Crowley with wide eyes, resting his chin on his knees.

"Just what?" Crowley asked. He and Aziraphale had not come into Adam's life until it was almost too late, but he'd sworn to be the boy's godparent all those years ago and he wasn't about to shirk that duty now. That meant talking through whatever was clearly upsetting him. It was almost nice to focus on someone else's problems after the maelstrom of his own emotions these last few days.

"I know I didn't look it," Adam whispered, "But, I've never been more scared than when my Father was coming. I'd done terrible things earlier in the day, I hurt my friends and I still don't understand why they forgave me and then they killed those things to save the world and I just knew that I was going to die because I was one of those things too and-"

Crowley leaned over and wrapped one arm around Adam's shoulders. He hated that Adam knew what that sort of self-recrimination felt like. Worse, he couldn't really tell the kid that feeling went away. The best he could say was;

"You're human, Adam," Crowley said, "That's what saved the day. You're human and that means you made some mistakes, but you get forgiven."

"But that's the point," Adam said. He swiped one hand across his nose, "I nearly ended the world and everyone forgave me because I'm just a kid and I get to live my life and, and-"

If feeling bad about what he did wasn't the problem, then why was Adam so upset? Crowley looked up, trying to catch Aziraphale's gaze to ask for a rescue. The angel was leaned in close to the glass of the greenhouse, carefully dragging his finger along in an enochian sigil. No help from him.

"What is it, Adam?"

"And weren't you just a kid when you asked _why_ for the first time?"

Crowley froze.

"What?" he asked.

"I keep hearing you talking," Adam said, "You say _why _and _please _and I know it's you, but it doesn't sound like you at all. You sound," he paused, struggling for words that did not exist in any human language.

"I sound like an angel," Crowley whispered.

"Yeah! You sound the way Mr. Aziraphale sounds when he thinks we aren't paying attention, like bells and light and my mom's singing[5]."

"The thing is," Adam continued, "After all that stuff happened in the summer, I read up on some bible stuff-"

"Oh don't do that," Crowley said, "Jimmy hired the worst translator. He said I had legs! As a snake! Ridiculous[6]."

"So, the stuff about demons originally being angels who Fell was wrong too?"

"Ah," Crowley rubbed the back of his neck, "No, that stuff is pretty accurate. Though, I wasn't one of the ones in the big fight. I Fell a bit later. I, uh, I just asked the wrong questions." The _why _in his soul howled and Adam flinched.

"But you were so young! If the Universe was made the same week as Adam and Eve you were just a kid!"

Adam sounded genuinely upset and Crowley was lost.

"I don't really know what you're getting at here," he said.

"What I mean is, you and Mr. Aziraphale and Anathema and Newt and, and _everyone _keeps telling me its okay that I nearly ended the world because I'm just a kid! That I'm forgiven and it'll all be fine. But, if you were a kid when you asked that question why are you still being punished? It's wrong!"

"Adam," Crowley said gently, "Angels don't really work that way. We aren't born like humans. God made us as we are today." He gestured to Aziraphale, "Or at least She made him the way he is today, I got changed a bit by the Fall." He pointed to his eyes. He knew his smile was more a grimace at this point, but it was the only mask he could summon. "So, we aren't ever kids. We were adults from the time we were made."

"But that's not fair!" Adam protested.

"Why?" He winced a little at asking the question he knew Adam could hear echoing through him.

"Everyone should get to make dumb mistakes and have their parents forgive them," Adam said. He sounded a little watery now. "It's not fair that you didn't get that."

There was a different kind of pain filling Crowley's chest. It was the same as the pain that filled him practically to bursting when he looked at Aziraphale, the kind of pain that hurt in a good way, like sore limbs after a workout or when your stomach ached after laughing too hard. He tightened the arm around Adam's shoulder.

"Sorry kid," he said, "It just doesn't work that way for us." Then, after a moment considering the despondent boy beside him, he continued, "I, uh, I really appreciate that you're upset for me though." He reached out to put one knuckle under Adam's chin, lifting so the boy was looking at him. "You shouldn't be though. I'm a demon and sometimes that's pretty awful, but I genuinely wouldn't trade it for the world." Even as he said it, he realized it was true.

The thorny tangle rested in his chest, but it dawned on him that if he wasn't what he was then he wouldn't have the life he had. He might not know Aziraphale at all. Or, he might be a different person and Aziraphale might not-

Aziraphale loved him. The full import of that hit him.

Aziraphale loved him like he was. Full of sin and temptation and a burning bitterness that he didn't think he would ever lose and his angel _loved him _despite all of that_. _Maybe even because of all that.

"Oh." It was more of a breath than a word, but Adam heard anyway.

"What?" he asked.

"Aziraphale told me, I mean he said, well, he, he loves me."

Beside him, Adam snorted. Crowley looked at him in shock.

"What?"

"Well, wasn't that obvious?" Adam asked.

"No?"

"But you told us he possessed Mrs. Tracy to get back to you? Why would he do that if he didn't love you? That's what people in love do in my mom's shows."

"I didn't say it was to get back to _me_, I meant like back to me as in the world."

Adam watched him in silence. It as an awfully judgy silence for an eleven year old, Crowley thought.

"Shut up, you." He muttered.

"Sure," Adam said.

They sat in silence for a bit longer watching their friends work.

"You should go back and play," Crowley said eventually. "The sun will be going down soon and Aziraphale will be upset if you're home late and your mother stops inviting us over for tea."

Adam stood up and started back towards the others. After a few steps he paused and turned back to Crowley.

"I still think it's really dumb that God turned you into a demon for asking questions," he said, "But, I don't think I would have been brave enough to face my Father without you and Mr. Aziraphale, so I guess it's not all bad?"

Crowley nodded, "No, not all bad, kid."

Then, he watched as the Anti-Christ, destroyer of this world and herald of the next age, ran to rejoin his friends and draw on the ground with chalk purchased at a petrol station.

* * *

An hour later, the Them departed in a riotous pack, already planning their next big adventure[7] . Aziraphale and Anathema shooed Newt from the greenhouse so they could activate the last of the wards.

"Alright?" Newt asked. Crowley had stood from his distant spot to bid the children farewell and now lingered near the edge of the wards. He could feel the power in them tingling across his true form, warm in the way only Aziraphale could be.

He grunted a response to Newt's question. He was unsure what to make of the man. Anathema liked him, though both she and Newt were quick to deny any relationship beyond friendship between housemates (with a notable slip towards the beginning). Crowley liked Anathema, against his better judgement at times, so he trusted her judgement of Newt. But, there was something crackling under Newt's skin that set Crowley on edge, an energy that was not meant for these days.

"How's, uh, how's the job search?" he asked. He'd played a big part in the invention of small talk, a fact he deeply regretted these days.

Newt beamed at him, "Solved! I visited my mum and was helping her organize her craft room and it hit me; computers are all just ones and zeroes and that's just a knit or a purl. So, I've been coding with needles and yarn, its brill. Not what I expected, but I'm getting much faster and people seem to like what I make."

Typically Crowley was only involved in humanities more objectionable inventions, so he wasn't quite sure about the details of what Newt was saying, but it sounded like he was happy so Crowley was happy for him.

He opened his mouth, unsure of what he was about to say beyond that it was likely to be inane and probably would mention the weather (lovely for the time of year really). Then, Aziraphale clapped his hands and a wave of power swept over them.

The wards were set.

"There," Aziraphale said, exiting the greenhouse, "Safe from curious humans, demons, and angels alike. No one will notice it unless you want them to, dear."

Crowley nodded his thanks. He was grateful for Anathema's help, neither angels nor demons had needed to combat witches for so many years they were out of practice. Using her family's wards was a surefire way to buy them a few moments if it came to that. He crossed the space between himself and Aziraphale, circled around the angel and stopping when Aziraphale was between him and the humans. Anathema eyed them with the too knowing gaze Crowley suspected every woman in her line possessed and turned to Newt.

"Come on," she said, "If we hurry we can stop by Mrs. Sanderson's cafe for a coffee before she closes."

"Ugh," Newt groaned, "You and your coffee. The whole house smells like it," he told them, "It's so bloody American."

Anathema grinned, "Well, you're living there rent free, so you better get to liking American things." Newt laughed and they bade each other farewell. As the two crossed back through the trees, Crowley could hear them talking about domestic things like whose turn it was to pick up groceries and if they had forgotten to take the trash out.

"That's an odd pair if ever I saw one," Crowley muttered.

Aziraphale chuckled. "Oh, I've seen odder." His hand found Crowley's again. This time Crowley was the one to intertwine their fingers.

Then, with a flash of bravery, he reached out with a piece of the self he kept tucked away in another plane of existence. Tiny tendrils of his essence snaking away from himself into the void between them, trembling. What if Aziraphale rejected him? What if he couldn't even feel the offer? Crowley hadn't tried this since before... Falling changed so much about him, what if this was just another thing he had lost?

His resolve faltered and he started to withdraw.

Then, Aziraphale Touched him.

Their hands were already touching. This was not that.

This was Aziraphale sensing that Crowley was reaching out and leaping forward to meet him. Where Crowley broached the space between them with thin tendrils, like the early filaments a seed uses to establish itself in good soil, Aziraphale was a beam of pure light, without restraint or hesitation.

The light met the tendrils and Crowley was bathed in all that Aziraphale was. The breath in his earthly body shuddered.

Aziraphale had told him that he was worthy, that what came after Eden was not his fault. It was not forgiveness, it was absolution and there was an entire universe between those ideas.

"Oh, Crowley," Aziraphale whispered. It came from his physical mouth and from the core of his true form in a many layered voice. It resonated through him, sending shock waves across his everything. Aziraphale wrapped himself around Crowley, all flaming wheels and eyes and soft arms and white curls and Crowley collapsed into him.

"I love you, too." He did not know if he said it with his mouth or with his soul or if he even said it at all or if it was just so obvious in his heart that Aziraphale could tell.

"I know, my dear," the angel said, "And I'm very sorry I made you wait so long."

In the pot, safe in a mix of sand and soil and surrounded by love, the little seed's roots began to grow for the last time.

* * *

[1] Their many times great granddaughters married in a lovely ceremony in Seattle and commissioned a bed made of Dove wood for their new home.

[2] If in fact they ever were enemies at all. When the formerAntiChrist asked about their history, Aziraphale claimed to have considered Crowley an adversary until around the time of the Great Flood. Crowley refused to answer the question.

[3] This is an awfully bold metaphor. The emotion roiling in Crowley's chest could more accurately be described thusly; when a baby sea turtle hatches from its egg, the only home it has known until that point, it emerges in a nest of sand dug by its mother. It, and any siblings who have also hatched, must dig their way upward to the light. Then, blinking and afraid and cold for the first time in their very short lives, they make their way across the beach to the waves. It is a journey fraught with peril from seagulls, terrestrial predators, and the odd human foot, but at the end, if they make it, sits the ocean and freedom. Crowley feels like one of those newly hatched turtles; emerging into a whole new world and terrified that he's going to mess it up, that he'll be devoured, before he makes it to the water.

[4] The thought that he might simply miracle away the paints if he did not like them occurred to him and was immediately dismissed. The humans were making something. For him. It was a staggering thought really.

[5] The children all staunchly refused to call Aziraphale anything but Mr. Aziraphale, to his chagrin and Crowley's unending delight.

[6] It would not occur to Adam until many days later that this statement implied Crowley was the Serpent in the garden of Eden. The demon in question would be gently planting cuttings stolen from the patios of Aziraphale's favorite restaurants. He would look up at Adam who was sitting on the ground struggling through a maths assignment and he would hold out two pots for Adam to choose between. One was a dusty teal and one was bright red, the same color as Pepper's favorite jacket or an apple, and Adam would realize just how long Crowley had been giving humanity choices. He would pick the red one.

[7] It seemed Pepper's reign was in danger and the Evil Lord Brian was going to be attempting an insurrection.


	11. Epilogue: The Wants of a Plant

A/N: I'm genuinely a little emotional about finishing this story. I've loved writing it so much and you've all been so amazing. Thank you so much for reading and commenting!

I hope this is a satisfying ending, I struggled a lot with how much to include haha. As always, I want to improve as a writer, so suggestions are 100% welcome!

(There are sequels to this; the first being about Warlock and Crowley post-Apocalypse and the second being about Aziraphale and his own issues with anxiety and negative emotions. Since FF is terrible about finding sequels I'm just going to post them in this story. Chapters which begin a new story will be labeled with "Part _: Title")

Also, there is art for this last chapter on my tumblr (randomacts13 dot tumblr dot com, under the tag 'my art')

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**Epilogue: The Wants of a Plant**

**Hogback Lane, Tadfield UK | August, 2026 | 7 Years after ****_It_**

Our tale ends as it began; with a seed, a demon, and a garden. This time, however, there are quite a few more people mingling about. It is mid-August and Adam Young is preparing to leave his home for university. His parents, quietly proud in the way that only the parents of a child they do not understand but love dearly can be, sent out invitations to the entire village. Thus, Adam is currently standing in the middle of a crowd comprising the better part of the population of Tadfield. The Antichrist is handsome and tan, with lean muscles built from four years as a striker for the local youth football club[1]. His elbows and knees are still knobbly in the way of teenagers the world over, pointy and scraped and scarred from a childhood spent running wild. His head is thrown back and he's laughing and he's never looked more human.

Beside him, Newt, now entering his mid-thirties and wearing a handmade jumper despite the late summer heat, is regaling Adam and Brian with the tale of the disastrous first date he went on last night. As he speaks Anathema slips in little comments, wry observations and clever quips and in-jokes that only long-term flatmates can understand. She set him up with Peggy and is delighted to learn that, despite spilling his soup all over the poor girl and accidentally setting _two_ phones on fire, there will be a second date in three days' time. Peggy has the distinction of being both incredibly patient and deeply scared of modern technology, so Anathema sees a future there.

A short distance away, Mr. Young is telling Mr. Davison from Number 3 that of course Adam was courted by not one, not two, but _three _top tier colleges. Mrs. Young puts in that they would be proud no matter where he ended up attending, but well, it is _Cambridge_ and they couldn't be happier. As they chat, Dog gambols about the garden, chasing butterflies and snapping playfully at little tufts of grass that catch his eye. Every so often he circles back around and presses a cold nose against Adam's shin, reassuring himself that his boy is still there, still safe, before darting away again.

The town of Tadfield is, in many ways, exactly as it was in the days leading up to the supposed-Apocalypse. The little cafe on High Street still opens its doors at 7:03 in the morning every day[2], the used bookshop across the lane still does a roaring trade in both popular fiction and dog-eared airport romance novels, and there are still small roving bands of children playing in the woods. Of course there are, as in every town, a few residents who find fault in everything, but they delight in doing so and are therefore content.

Tadfield is peaceful.

Tadfield is quiet.

Tadfield is perhaps the most supernaturally endowed spot in the entire UK[3]

Even ignoring, as one never should, the fact that the Antichrist called the village home, over the course of the last seven years the entirety of Heaven and Hell's forces on Earth have made Tadfield something of a second residence. Of course, this sounds less impressive when one considers that due to lingering wariness over the events of their trials, both Above and Below have decided that discretion is the better part of valor when it comes to contacting their agents or sending reinforcements. Thus, an angel and a demon have been free to live their lives in exactly the manner they wish to; slow and quiet and filled with no small number of very human indulgences[4]

The nexus of supernatural activity is a greenhouse on the edge of a meadow less than ten kilometers from the garden party at Hogback Lane. On even careful observation the greenhouse appears normal, if a tad garishly decorated. The flagstones are covered in a riot of chalk drawings, carefully preserved over the years with layered Miracles. The late afternoon sunlight streams in, through wide panes of clear glass and small panels stained in reds and blues. It catches on delicate crystals hung from the beams by handspun yarn. The crystals, meant to act as anchors for the wards that protect the spot from prying eyes, reflect the sunshine in sharp shards of light that play across the gentle curves of the clay pots that litter the space. Nominally reddish-brown, the pots have been covered by layers of paint over the last seven years as Newt and Pepper learned new techniques. Their original color is now almost completely lost. In one corner, there is a tartan armchair with a hand-knitted throw and a small table, just large enough for a book and two mugs.

The most surprising feature of the greenhouse, to those who know Crowley at least, is the small bookshelf. It appears one afternoon, looking just bedraggled enough that Aziraphale suspects it is rescued from the side of the road rather than Miracled into existence, and finds a place against the back wall. When asked, Crowley mutters something about Aziraphale's books being left all over the floor. This is patently untrue for a number of reasons, the primary of which is that Aziraphale would rather be discorporated than leave a book _on the ground. _However, he says nothing, suspecting Crowley is embarrassed about being caught rescuing someone else's unwanted item.

In truth, the bookshelf is meant to hold Crowley's growing collection of gardening tomes. The collection begins simply enough; nearly a year after Aziraphale gifted him the greenhouse, Crowley ventures to the local garden center for the first time. It is high summer and despite the heat baking the countryside he wears his customary vest-jeans-jacket combination in all black. The moment he steps through the doors, he is accosted by a gaggle of elderly women who tut over his clothes and tap on his cheeks, and generally make a nuisance of themselves.

Their names are Ethel, Marie, and Rose and between them they hold more than thirty regional championships for their gardens. They also take one look at the lack of dirt on his shoes or under his nails and determine he needs all the help he can get. Marie presses 'Soil pH and My Flowers: The Essential Guide' into his hands and then, when he admits he isn't even sure what sort of plant he is trying to grow, pulls him over to a large encyclopedia of plants. He spends three enjoyable hours perusing the book with the ladies before one of the pages grows warm beneath his fingers.

This is it. The unnecessary breath catches in his chest.

He drinks the image in with wide eyes, the truth of it a cool balm against a parched heart. This is what the seed is meant to be. This is what it will be. It's been a year and the seed is still growing. Still alive. Every day it doesn't die soothes an ache deep inside. He hasn't yelled at the other plants in nearly a week now, hasn't even felt the desire to.

_Welwitschia mirabilis. _He mouths the name. Beside him, Rose lays one hand on his arm.

"Are you quite alright, love?" She asks and he hears Aziraphale. He swallows and nods.

"Yeah," he rasps. "It's just. Erg. I, uh, I've been trying to grow it for, eh, a long time."

Ethel laughs from the other side, "I'm sure it's not so long as it seems! Marie spent, what was it, five years trying to grow a single tulip in the 80s?"

Marie sniffs, "Four years. And I wasn't just _growing _it. I was working at the University as a biological engineer and we were bringing it back to life. That takes time, Ethel." Her words have the feel of a well trod argument and Crowley allows his attention to drift back to the book.

He brushes his fingers across the picture of a large plant growing in cracked soil. Ethel watches him for a moment before vanishing to the back of the shop and returning with an entire armful of books about the greenhouse cultivation of species which prefer arid climates. She takes 'Soil Ph' from him and replaces it with 'A Conspiracy of Cacti' volumes one and two. Then, Rose points out that Debbie Freedlen says 'Conspiracy' is outdated and he really should be reading '365 Days of Cacti' because it's clearly more evidence based and Crowley is treated to an hour long argument. On the whole, it is one of the more pleasant afternoons he can recall. He leaves the garden center with a stack of books, three phone numbers, and a promise to call them if he has any questions.

The books live on the shelf, interspersed between mass market versions of Aziraphale's favorite novels. One day, not long after his first visit to the garden center, Aziraphale is amazed to catch Crowley not only reading the books, but taking careful notes in the margins in his genuinely dreadful handwriting. When the highlighter makes an appearance he decides to vacate the greenhouse for a bit. It's been a while since he saw Newt and the boy had been making noises about entering a knitting competition. Besides, he doesn't want Crowley to realize he's been caught reading and grow embarrassed.

Aziraphale is cultivating something of his own in this greenhouse and he is nothing if not patient. He learned from the best after all.

Slowly, the greenhouse acquires more plants. When they hear he is focusing on cacti and succulents, Anathema brings him a cutting from one of her mother's favorite cacti at their house in California. Adam finds seeds in a packet at the drugstore and buys them with his allowance. Aziraphale accompanies him around London as he steals clippings from the best looking succulents[5] On the anniversary of the Apocalypse that didn't happen, Adam presents him with a mister in the shape of an angel that he adores (for the irony of course).

Soon, the greenhouse is nothing at all like the bleak garden Crowley ruled over in London. In fact, there are only two plants in this greenhouse that ever saw the flat. The first is a small christmas cactus that, when he gathers up his plants to divest himself of them, begins to tremble and wilt. It's an odd reaction given that the rest of the plants seem ecstatic to be free of him. Not that he blames them in the slightest for that. Or, well, he blames them. But, not in a malicious way. Privately, in the deep part of his mind he reserved for the thoughts he never wants anyone else to hear, he is hurt that they are so eager to be rid of him. Hadn't he given them everything they needed? Hadn't he made them strong?[6]The point of this is to say that a plant that seemed genuinely upset to leave him stood out. So, he keeps it and gives it a cozy spot beside the terrifically hideous tartan armchair he will never admit to specifically Miracling for Aziraphale. There it receives only a few hours of sunshine each day and thrives in a way it never had in the flat.

The other plant with memories of Crowley's Mayfair flat is, of course, The Plant.

The Plant, Crowley refuses to give it a name despite Aziraphale's suggestions, has grown rapidly in the last seven years. Now, its base fills the pot and its leaves curl out over the sides in a tangle of greenish-yellow. Some days Crowley can barely tear himself away from watching it grow; seven years is not enough time to enjoy something you've wanted for 3000. There are only ever two leaves, but as the plant grows they widen and eventually split, so it appears as if there are many more. It seems he discovers something new to love about it every day.

First, a week after the final time he plants the seed, there is the way the sprout peeks from the soil. It's green and red and so very familiar. He's seen that sprout so, so many times.

Then, a week after that, the base of the sprout begins to harden into something woody and new and his heart sings because he's never seen that before. He spends the next week unable to leave the greenhouse, terrified that if he leaves the spell will be broken and the plant will wither away again. Aziraphale brings him cool bottles of water and sits on the ground with a book, always by his side and always ready with a gentle hand when Crowley's anxieties spiral up and out and around.

Two months later the leaves began to curl and Crowley finds he loves the gentle whorls their edges follow, so like the curls on Aziraphale's head.

A year later he loves the solid strength of the base, broad and rounded and secure in the same way as Aziraphale's shoulders.

He loves the little nubs of stalks that appear three years in, and the brightly colored edges of the seed pods that top them.

He loves the way the tips of the leaves brush against the edges of the pot when, at four years, they grow long enough to spill over the side. He loves the smell of the plant, dry and warm and ancient in a way he can never put into words.

At six years he loves the way the leaves feel against his skin when he naps against the side of the pot, the sun on his face and the sound of pages rasping against each other surrounding him.

At seven years he loves that he never tires of it. Of any of it. He never tires of the drive from London to Tadfield, Queen blasting and Aziraphale gripping the oh-shit bar. He never tires of tea at the cottage shared by Anathema and Newt or walks through the center of town. Aziraphale delights in alternately raiding the used bookstore for his own collection and mocking them for making it possible for customers to actually buy books.

He loves watching the Them grow up. He's never spent much time in a single place, not like this, not when he's actually part of something. Aziraphale tells him that humans always grow and change this quickly, he's watched it for decades in SoHo after all. When Aziraphale says it, he sounds sad. Crowley doesn't think its sad at all. Of course thinking about them dying is an awful, sucking pit of grief that hovers just at the edges of his consciousness. But, Crowley loves plants and watching the children grow, watching Newt find his first grey hair and promptly start searching for dyes, watching Mr. and Mrs. Young develop laugh lines, well, it all just seems like watching one of his plants thrive. He's knows it will end and it will end soon, but for now he delights in what they have. It's easier to think of it positively these days. Easier to set the looming grief aside and just enjoy the moment when he can take some time to himself in the greenhouse and just Be.

So the years pass, slowly and quickly, with long months of peace and sporadic days of strife[7]. Neither Above nor Below contacts them so they both continue their assigned tasks as they always have, simply with more freedom to do as they wish. These are, Crowley thinks one evening as he drifts off to sleep with his head pillowed against Aziraphale's chest, the best years in all of Creation.

Soon, all too soon, Adam and his friends are at the cusp of adulthood and Crowley and Aziraphale receive a single invitation to a garden party in Adam's honor. As soon as they RSVP Aziraphale begins a careful search of his bookshop, looking for the tomes he feel will best prepare a young man for all that life is going to put in his path. He hems and haws over which are correct, is it better to provide negative examples or positive? Books by young men or only about them? Prose or poetry? After enduring days of debate, Crowley is obligated to search out Adam's course schedule to find out if a book in Ancient Greek would be understood. Crowley takes to spending even more time the greenhouse to avoid being pulled into another debate about the relative merits of Keats and Wilde. He hates talking about Wilde.

Adam receives the books with outright awe.

"But, these are your books!" he says. The previous year, after his parents started making noise about summer jobs, Aziraphale had hired Adam as a temporary employee. It was a delightful summer in which they spent more time taking him to museums and restaurants than actually working. The teen is therefore possibly the only person in Earth besides Crowley to truly understand how difficult it is for Aziraphale to part with books.

Aziraphale smiles and pats Adam on the shoulder. "You deserve them, dear boy," then he looks as if a thought occurs to him, "Of course, if you damage them I _will_ know."

Adam sets the books down very carefully and wraps the startled angel in a quick hug. "Thank you, Mr. Aziraphale."

Flustered, Aziraphale points to the rest of the gifts to distract from himself and Adam turns back to his guests. Crowley watches them fondly, pleased that for once he's not the one being caught off guard.

Slowly, the party winds down. It's a calm affair to begin with and as evening comes on the guest begin to trickle away like sand in an hourglass. Soon, Aziraphale is looking at his pocket watch and making noises about getting back to London if they're going to make it to the theater on time and Crowley knows this is the moment he's been dreading all day.

Aziraphale says goodbye and thank you for the invitation to Mr. and Mrs. Young. Then, he turns to Adam.

"I expect you'll give us a call if you need anything," he says sternly. "We won't hesitate to drive up. And of course, we'll be here whenever you're on break." Mr. and Mrs. Young, having been Miracled into thinking that Crowley and Aziraphale are long time family friends, smile at one another.

Adam nods eagerly and as he starts to speak, Crowley slips away. Aziraphale will know where to find him. He crosses the garden and exits through a worn patch in the hedge. There's a bench here and no one drives this stretch of road at night. He's better about showing emotion these days, but still wants the security of avoiding prying eyes. As he waits, he takes off his sunglasses and cleans them, inspecting the lens for minute imperfections before replacing them.

After a few minutes, there is a rustling and Dog appears beside the bench. The little terrier peers at him for a long moment before backing up and taking a running leap to the bench beside Crowley. The demon smiles.

"Hullo," he says, "You've done a good job with him." Dog puffs out his chest. He's rightfully proud of the work he's done protecting the Antichrist over the last seven years.

"You'll continue to do it in Cambridge." It is not a question. Crowley might like the beast, but they are still creatures of Hell and requests are not made between those of their kind. Dog huffs out a sharp little breath. "Good," Crowley says. "You know how to contact me if you need me."

"Can he talk to you?" Adam is leaning around the edge of the blank spot in the hedge.

Crowley laughs and leans back where he sits, resting his arms along the back of the bench. His legs are sprawled out in the picture of casual confidence. "No," he says, "Not like you're thinking. But, we're made of the same stuff and we understand each other."

Adam nods. He reaches out and scritches Dog's left ear. The hellhound leans into his touch.

"So, university," Crowley says after a moment.

"University." Adam smiles at him. "I'm really excited, but like, it's sad too?" Crowley nods. He doesn't quite understand that feeling. He doesn't remember liking Heaven in the way he knows Adam loves Tadfield and he'd never been anything but eager to leave Hell.

Hearing the nerves in Adam's voice, Crowley makes a snap decision. "I have a, erg, friend who will be at Cambridge this year."

Adam raises one eyebrow, "You have friends other than Mr. Aziraphale?"

"Cheeky bugger," Crowley mutters. Then, because he likes to be honest, "No. I don't. He's, ah, okay so you know how we told you about losing you as a baby and raising the wrong kid?"

"Yes?"

"He's him."

"What?" Adam picks up Dog and settles him in his lap. The hellhound spins in a circle before resting his head on Adam's arm.

"The boy we sort of raised, Warlock, will be starting at Cambridge at the same time as you." Crowley says. "He's annoying and a little rude, but so is Pepper and you like her so I thought you might-" And that's the extent of the words he has on the subject. He desperately hopes that Adam will seek Warlock out. The other boy has confided in Nanny Ashtoreth at their monthly tea and cakes meet-up that he's terribly afraid of being the odd man out yet again.

Adam nods. "I'll find him," he promises. He looks like he wants to say something else on the topic but, upon seeing the expression on Crowley face stops. Instead he smiles and says, "Thank you for the books. They're aces."

Crowley yanks himself from his worries about Warlock and sits up straight. "I would never," he hisses, "give you _booksss _as a graduation present."

"Oh," Adam laughs, "Well I suppose a demon shouldn't be giving a human gifts anyway. You might get in trouble."

Crowley waves one hand. "Fuck hell," he says and means it. "And don't be daft, of course I got you a present. It's just not books." Crowley reaches behind himself and extracts a small grey box from the shrubbery.

"Couldn't you have just made that appear?" Crowley has a strong memory of complaining to Aziraphale about the same thing and is sharply grateful the angel is not standing here just now.

"Well, yes, but I didn't want to," Crowley gives Adam a smile he knows is softer than it should be and Adam returns it. If asked, Adam Young would tell anyone in the know that _of course_ Aziraphale is his favorite. It is the correct answer, the one that makes people feel alright about the Antichrist still wandering the world in possession of a good many of his Gifts. But, it is not the true answer. Oh, he dearly loves Aziraphale of course, but he feels a deep kinship with Crowley who has also chosen to subvert his very essence in favor of humanity. Plus, he likes the demon's hair. If asked, Crowley would say that Adam is 'alright if a bit cheeky'[8].

"Well, go on, open it." Crowley leans back with his hands across the back of the bench. Dog pops up from his curled up position and noses at the box. Adam, possessed of a great many delightful attributes and not a single one of them approaching patience, rips the twine off and slides the box open.

Then he looks up at Crowley.

"I can't," he half-whispers.

Crowley frowns. "Why not? It's a gift."

"But it's yours!"

Crowley sighs, takes the grey box from Adam's hands, and reaches in. He extracts the contents and opens his palms so it is perfectly centered. The little red pot, repairs with heavily application of an angelic Miracle and 3000 years old, sits there practically glowing in the sunshine. It is filled with a 50/50 mix of good soil and sand and poking up through the center are two very tiny red leaves.

"I have mine back at the greenhouse. She's healthy and huge, you've seen her," Crowley says. He holds the pot out to Adam. "I don't need the starter pot anymore and my plant has started putting out seeds. I thought you might like to have one. A dormitory plant as it were[9]."

"Wow," Adam says reverently. With shaking hands he reaches out and gently cradles the pot. "I'll water it every day."

"Nope!" Crowley says, brightly. "There are a few rules and that's the first. Water no more than once a week, it does best when allowed to grow at its own pace, so no rushing it." He waggles one finger in a stern impression of Aziraphale.

Adam nods seriously. He's paying closer attention than he thinks he ever did in school. "Of course."

"And of course talk to it. I think you'll find it's a surprisingly good listener."

"Every day."

"Good." Now Crowley looks a little uncomfortable. He rubs one hand along the back of his neck, twisting it in a way that is not possible with the number of cervical vertebrae humans are meant to have. "And, well, be nice to it." It's said in a rush, important but still uncomfortable for the demon, even after seven years of practice with the idea.

Adam can not hold back any longer. He sets the plant down beside Dog and lunges forward, seizing Crowley in a tight hug. He has grown quite a bit since they met, but the top of his head still fits just under Crowley's chin.

"I promise," he swears, his voice thick.

Crowley nods, unwilling to speak and reveal that he is a tad choked up himself.

"Right. Now, if you will just detach yourself." He makes a show of peeling Adam's arms from his sides and stands from the bench, straightening his suit jacket as he goes. "I expect we'll see you around the shop at your earliest opportunity. Don't forget or Aziraphale would be heart broken."

At that moment, as if by divine providence[10] Aziraphale appears at the edge of the garden.

"Come along Crowley." He is holding his watch. "We're going to be late to the show if we don't leave right now, no matter how fast you plan on driving."

"Yeah, yeah," Crowley steps away from Adam. He pats Dog on the head once and then ruffles Adam's hair. And then he is off, slinking towards Aziraphale without a backwards glance.

"Yeah," Adam tells Dog, "_Aziraphale_ would be heart broken." He watches the two of them walk away, already bickering, their shoulders brushing every few steps and their voices light. He smiles.

Then, he picks up the little pot and rejoins the Them and the rest of his family.

The angel and the demon leave the garden to make their way back to London and the theater. Crowley is genuinely excited about the play, its meant to be Hamlet, but the actors are all wearing fursuits and speak only Pig Latin. It's going to be terrible. Aziraphale is far more excited about the private balcony he acquired for them.

He has _plans. _

They do not, if all goes right, involve paying any attention at all to the play.

Crowley depresses the accelerator and spurs the Bentley to ever increasing speeds. He's smiling broadly, contented in a way that Aziraphale had never hoped to see and the angel is unable to resist the urge to touch him. He reaches over and wraps his hand around his demon's. Crowley squeezes back, intertwining their fingers and almost thoughtlessly lifting the hand to his mouth to press his lips to the back. It sends a rush of adrenaline through Aziraphale. Human-style intimacy is so strange and their corporations are so easily flustered.

He scans the demon's face and, upon noting the splash of crimson high on his cheekbones, revises his plans. Maybe he can convince Crowley to leave the play at intermission?

They cross the village boundary leaving Tadfield and Aziraphale sends a light blessing back in the direction of the greenhouse. The plant doesn't need it, but Aziraphale isn't taking any chances with his demon's happiness.

Behind them, a bud on the plant bursts into bloom, the flower-like cone unfolding to reveal deep crimson scales shot through with tiny threads of sky blue.

A single seed works its way free and falls to the ground.

* * *

[1] Pepper and Brian had joined him; Pepper as a fellow striker and Brian as a solid, if distractible goalkeeper. Pepper planned to continue playing at university and had been excitedly pushing the boys to workout with her the entire summer. Wensleydale played cricket and cricket only, insisting that it was the only true sport."

[2] The sign on the window says it will open at 7:30, but the owner, a lovely woman by the unfortunate name of Marla Moon always arrives at precisely 7:00 and sees no reason not to open the doors as soon as her own tea is in hand.

[3] I say 'perhaps' because there is a narrow inlet to the northwest of Cradhlastadh in the Scottish Hebrides which shows up in an alarming number of Miracle reports in both Heaven and Hell. Neither Crowley or Aziraphale has ever visited the spot, to their knowledge, and no visiting angels or demons will admit to popping over for a quick Miracle. It's a mystery that puzzles Crowley and actively drove Aziraphale up the ethereal wall. He spent three weeks in the spring of 2022 staked out, watching and waiting for a Miracle to happen and returned with no answers, a corporation that had caught a rather persistent cold, and an abiding hatred for Hebridean sheep.

[4] Both 'slow' and 'quiet' here should be taken to mean 'when not in the Bentley'. When in the Bentley, Crowley preferred that his life be as loud and as fast as possible without discorporation. The Bentley agreed.

[5] The fact that they tend to come from their favorite restaurants is not lost on Aziraphale, though he says nothing.

[6] The plants knew both of those facts were true. They also knew that strength through threats of violence, strength through fear, was not sustainable or fair and so they were happy to be abandoned. Neither party noticed the obvious parallels to Crowley's own early life. Aziraphale noticed, but wisely resisted the urge to do anything beyond help Crowley distribute the plants to his increasingly baffled neighbors.

[7] He and Aziraphale disagree fundamentally about some things and neither is one to concede their position. Crowley delights in their arguments. Aziraphale's face grows red so quickly and his hands move so wildly. It's all Crowley can do to stay mad. Sometimes he can't manage it and instead reaches out to take Aziraphale's hand, stilling it with a gentle brush of his lips.

[8] This was a vast understatement. Crowley had never loved anyone the same way he loves Adam and Warlock, though he would be hard pressed to put the emotion into words that make sense outside of his own head. It is a complicated tangle of pride and fondness and genuine amusement and a hefty measure of shame, because the boys are so so much better than he will ever be. Were he able to put this into words, any decent parent would have understood immediately.

[9] It is perhaps a sign of how little time either of them spends with the average person that the idea of a 3000 year old pot in a dormitory did not seem at all strange to either.

[10] Reader, it was not. I do not interfere with the comings and goings of individual angels. Mostly.


	12. Part 2: More than Pennies on Pavement

**Part 2: More Than Pennies on Pavement**

_**Summary:** Warlock Dowling is a fundamentally lonely boy. He always has been, but before his birthday it was okay because he had Nanny Ashtoreth and Brother Francis and they were weird but they were his weird. Now he has neither and he's been sent off to boarding school and, well, he's really very lonely. _

_(Crowley might have his own issues he's working through, but if there's one thing that always been true about the angel who became a demon through asking too many questions it is this; Crowley has never in the entirety of his existence been able to disappoint a child when he had the capability of doing otherwise. Never.)_

**A/N:** This story takes place between chapters 10 and 11 of "For Want of a Seed" and is intended to explain Adam and Warlock's relationship at the time of "The Right of It" (Part 3 of this series, begins next chapter here!)

(Note: I am going with the interpretation that Crowley is using he/him pronouns again post apocal-oops. However, there is a discussion about that in this chapter from Warlock's POV where Warlock uses she/her at first. As always, I am 100% willing to fix any error I have made in these sorts of discussions, please just let me know!)

**Wellington Boarding School for Boys | Colgate, UK | Two Months After**

There were very few truths that Warlock Dowling could claim were universal in his experience. The first was that politicians, each and every one, were untrustworthy assholes who did not deserve one's time or energy. He included his father in this evaluation. There were only so many missed football matches a young boy could forgive after all. Thaddeus never improved and over the years both Warlock and the gulf between father and son grew rapidly.

The second truth was that almost no one was going to listen to a single word he said. It was almost miraculous really, he could throw a fit, yell, scream, cuss- none of it seemed to matter. When he was younger, the fact bothered him. He desperately wanted his mother to listen as he told her about the slugs Brother Francis showed him. He wanted his father to pay attention as he tried to work out the wording on a practice essay for end of year testing. But, as he approached his teen years he realized that the way his words slid off others was a benefit. He could say what he wanted when he wanted and no one cared.

It was freedom.

The final truth was this; his parents might not like him, but that was okay because he had Nanny and Nanny liked him just fine.

Except, that truth was maybe not as universal as young Warlock liked to think it was.

Nanny left.

She departed from the Dowling household the day before Warlock turned eleven. He didn't even notice. He had been nervous about the party, afraid his mother had booked lame entertainment and the children of his father's coworkers wouldn't like him anymore. He tried to keep Nanny's words in mind; it should not matter what they think of you, they are but dust in the wind that lifts you to your rightful place as ruler of this little world[1].

Warlock did not realize that the day she left was meant to be his last time seeing her. In fact, he did not know until after they returned from their trip to the Middle East, when he asked his father when Nanny was coming back from vacation and learned that she had been let go because he was 'too old for that namby-pamby nonsense'.

It was devastating.

He left the house immediately, running for the gardens with the wild abandon only a distraught child can quite manage. Brother Francis said it was okay to cry and Warlock wasn't sure that was quite right, but just then he wanted desperately to sob and he wanted someone to tell him it was going to be okay. Brother Francis was pretty good at that.

Except.

Except, Brother Francis was gone too.

Warlock spent that entire afternoon curled up in the garden shed, ignoring the world and crying himself to exhaustion atop a bag of potting soil.

Eventually, he drug himself inside to his bed where he collapsed in an ungainly heap in the mounds of pillows and blankets that Nanny told him were only appropriate for the little King on Earth. The room was quiet. He could faintly hear his father's snores from a few rooms down and the sounds of the kitchen staff bustling about.

But there was no noise in his room aside from his breathing.

He wanted Nanny to sing him a song.

He loved her voice. It was lower than his mom's, raspy and warm and full of the promise that everything was going to be okay. Before his birthday he couldn't remember a single night when he hadn't fallen asleep to her singing.

The tears were back. He pulled his legs up, curling into a little ball. The news had said the world was going crazy, there were aliens and fish falling from the sky and Atlantis and, here in the dark and the quiet, Warlock was scared.

He wanted his Nanny.

* * *

Months later, he sat at the edge of the football pitch, watching some of his new classmates kick the ball around with their visiting siblings and parents. No one was coming to see him. His mother was accompanying his father on some big important diplomatic thing and promised to come next time. It was what she'd said for the last three family days.

Suddenly, someone dressed all in black settled onto the bench beside him. Warlock looked up and gasped.

"Nanny Ashtoreth!" He launched himself into a hug, wrapping his arms around Nanny's slim frame without hesitation. Her arms came up and gripped him tightly for a moment before pulling back. Warlock took a few seconds to wipe his eyes as subtly as he could before looking at her again. Nanny looked different. Her hair had been cropped close to her head on the sides with a wild nest left longer on top. She wasn't wearing her customary skirt and blouse. Even her sunglasses were different.

A sudden thought occurred to Warlock. Nanny wasn't employed by his family anymore. She might not even be a nanny, or, and the thought made him feel vaguely ill, she might have another kid she cared for.

And she was dressed so differently than normal. She opened her mouth to say something, but Warlock cut her off before she could speak.

"Can I," Warlock looked at the ground as he spoke, nervous for reasons he could not define. He'd never been nervous around Nanny before. "Can I still call you Nanny?"

"What?" He looked up. Nanny's voice was very, very quiet.

"I won't if you don't want me to!" Warlock promised, "I know my dad fired you and I totally get if you're mad. If you want me to call you something else I will!" He was suddenly terrified he'd said something wrong and now Nanny wouldn't come back and he'd be alone again.

Nanny stood from the bench and knelt before him.

"Warlock-"

"I'm sorry!" Warlock stood as well. "Please don't leave!"

Nanny's face was twisted into an expression he'd never seen on it before.

"You can call me whatever you want, dear." Warlock really did not like the tone in her voice, it was low and almost sad, tangled up in a way he couldn't parse. He thought for a minute. Nanny was dressed differently than ever before. She always looked fancy in a very British way according to his mother. He loved her stern skirts and the little flashes of red she wore when she wanted to make him smile. She had a seemingly infinite collection of collar pins depicting snakes that he delighted in giving posh names. Sir Archibald Worthington Picknet III, a tightly coiled viper in brilliant green, was his personal favorite.

But now- now she was wearing pants. He'd never seen her in pants before. Beside him were slim pants and shoes without heels and a suit jacket that did not have any sort of embellishment he could see, none of the lace or frills Nanny had seemed to secretly enjoy.

Nanny had _never _worn pants.

When Warlock was eight, Nanny had taught him about people who chose their own names. He'd been bullied that day at school for his name and come home crying about how he hated it and wished for a normal name, one like John or James or Kelly. Nanny explained that, if he really wanted, she would call him any of those names and when he was old enough she would help him get it legally changed. She said people changed their names for all kinds of reasons, because they did not like their given name or they wanted something different or they got married or they realized that it wasn't who they were. She said that sometimes people changed more than just their name, sometimes people changed how they looked or dressed or the words other people used to refer to them or maybe all of those things. They'd needed to pause for a brief grammar lesson at that point because he did not quite understand what a pronoun was, but Nanny was a patient teacher and he loved learning from her.

He looked back at Nanny, in pants and flat shoes and short hair.

"What do you want me to call you?" he asked. That had been a very important part of that conversation, he remembered, always do what people wanted you to when it came to their name or the words you used to refer to them. People were going to follow him into battle one day, Nanny had said sternly, but you can't be a good leader if you don't respect your troops.

Nanny's face softened.

"I go by Crowley these days."

"Crowley?" Warlock tried the name out. It was unusual, but no more so than _Warlock. _He smiled.

"Hello, Crowley," he said.

"Hello, Warlock," Crowley said, "I've also been using the same pronouns you do."

"Okay," Warlock nodded fiercely. He loved Na-Crowley and he would never do anything to hurt him. Warlock did not care what Crowley dressed like, if she did her make-up or he wore slim cut trousers, or what name he chose to use. All Warlock cared about what that Crowley was here, he was here and he didn't have to be and Warlock loved him.

"But," and now Crowley leaned in as if sharing a great secret, "I might not always use that name or those pronouns. I like them right now, but in a few years? Who knows really. And, can I tell you something else?"

Warlock nodded.

"You can still call me Nanny if you want."

"Really?"

Crowley nodded. "Nanny is a title, not a name. It doesn't say anything about who I am as a person except the meaning you give it. I'd be honored to still be your Nanny." Warlock wasn't quite sure what any of that meant.

"Are you sure?"

Nanny stood from the ground and sat back on the bench beside Warlock. He reached over and pulled the boy into a side hug, pressing him to his side the same way Nanny had after his infrequent nightmares.

"I am one hundred percent sure. Now, why aren't you out there showing them why you're the best team captain they could hope for?"

Being a leader was a big part of Nanny's lessons. Warlock winced.

"They don't like me much," he said. "And, well, they have parents and stuff here and I don't."

"Well, that's just dumb," Nanny said, "You have me and I'm better than any stock broker or whatever silly job they think is important."

Warlock laughed. Branson had been bragging that his dad was a stockbroker that morning over breakfast.

"Now, how about we go over there and you practice being a little mini-Hannibal, yeah?"

"Okay." Warlock still wasn't sure, but Nanny would be there and she'd never let him be hurt.

He spent the entire afternoon playing football with the other kids, shouting out plans and ideas and, to his wonder, they _listened_. Nanny shouted his encouragement from the sidelines, earning odd looks from the other visitors, but appearing to ignore them entirely.

When finally, exhausted and sweaty, the children decided it was time to stop, Nanny clicked his fingers and Warlock found he didn't smell anymore. It was an old trick from when he was small and still hated baths. He laughed and grabbed his hand.

"Come on! There's a library here that makes dad's look like total shit, You'll love it[2]!"

* * *

As the afternoon slipped towards evening, Warlock found himself growing tired. It was unusual, he hadn't been so much as drowsy the entire time he'd been at school. Or, really, he hadn't been tired since Nanny left and he stopped being tucked in the way he liked.

Nanny seemed to notice his attention drifting from the collected tales of Genghis Khan and looked up from the book, a smile curling the corners of his lips.

"Are you ready to sleep?" He asked.

Warlock shook his head. He did not want to go to bed because that would mean visitor's day was over and Nanny would leave and Warlock really did not want to go back to being alone. He hadn't even properly realized how lonely he was until Nanny was there.

Nanny's smile grew. "Excellent," he said, "I have a tube of superglue and some coins that happened to fall out of your Headmaster's pocket, shall we?"

Warlock stared. For all that he was encouraged to make trouble and strife, Nanny had never so overtly asked if he wanted to cause mischief. His face, devoid of the makeup Warlock was used to seeing, was far more open and cheerful than it had ever been before. One eyebrow was arched up over the edge of the large sunglasses in question.

"What do we do with superglue and stolen money?" Warlock asked.

"Oh, it's a classic," Nanny stood and tossed the book behind him where it hit a bookshelf and fell to the ground with a resounding thump. "Come on." Warlock hopped to his feet, his previous exhaustion banished by Nanny's open eagerness.

"Now, the first time I did this was in Rome," Nanny said as they exited the library.

Warlock had never been to Rome, his parents had three times, but those were always work trips and children were not welcome on work trips. He desperately wanted to see the ruins of the Forum, to walk around something that old and picture all the tales Nanny had told him happening around him. He wanted to stand where the Caesars stood and imagine people listened to him the way they listened to them.

"Not modern Rome, mind you," Nanny continued, "Proper Rome, Old Rome. See, I was there on a little Temptation for the company I used to work for and this absolute wanker kept bumping into me. So, I follow him around and figure out he owes a few people quite a bit of money. Then, when he's asleep I take some sestertii and go around attaching them to every surface I could find on his walk to work. He went mad trying to get the coins up for the next few weeks."

Warlock, having never knowing a life without Nanny's odd tales, did not think it was strange for him to be talking as if ancient Roman coins were still used in the modern day or about Old Rome as if he'd been there. What Warlock found odd was the genuinely pleased tone in Nanny's voice. It wasn't that Nanny had always been sad or anything, more that even a child as isolated as Warlock could tell there was something bothering the person he loved more than any other. Whatever that something was, he thought, it was clearly gone now.

"So we're going to superglue coins to the ground?" He asked.

Nanny's grin turned a little sinister. "We're going to superglue a lot of coins to the ground," he said.

And so they did.

They spent the next few hours gluing coins to as many surfaces as they could reach[3].Finally, when Warlock was swaying on his feet, Nanny paused in his quest to climb the statue of Beauford H Wellington, the schools founder, to replace his eyes with gold coins.

"Are you ready to sleep?" he asked.

Warlock wanted to say no again, he really did. But, he also really wanted to curl up under his covered and listen to Nanny sing again. Nanny seemed to sense this, because he pat Warlock on the shoulders and said;

"It's alright, Warlock. Humans need to sleep," his voice was low and kind, "Let's get you upstairs, hmm?"

"But, I don't want you to leave." Warlock bit back a wince of embarrassment. Nanny always said that weakness was not something that good leaders tolerated or displayed. "I mean, uh-"

The hand on his shoulder shifted from a light pat to a grip that reeled Warlock in to Nanny's side. Warlock leaned into the cool embrace, Nanny was always cool. It was comforting to feel, so much about Nanny was different, but this was the same as always.

"It's alright to want me to stay," Nanny said as they climbed the stairs. Warlock's exhausted feet tried to trip on the steps, but Nanny did not allow him to falter. "You're allowed to want things, dearest."

Warlock sniffed. Nanny only rarely called him any sort of pet name, but he treasured the moments when she did. He knew most boys his age hated that stuff, but, well, Nanny had said not to measure himself by what most boys were doing. It hit him all of a sudden. All of the uncertainty and loneliness and fear that Nanny left because of him. He screwed up his face, trying valiantly to stop the tears that wanted to burst forth.

"Come now," Nanny said. Warlock looked up and found they were standing in his bedroom and he had no memory at all of the door opening. Nanny led him over to the rumpled bed and sat down, pulling Warlock along with him.

"Now, what's all this about?" Nanny said.

Warlock's throat worked, a sob trying to tear itself from his chest. "I-" he said and then paused, unwilling to allow his words to be marred by tears. He took a few deep breaths, leaning heavily against Nanny's side. "Did you leave because of me?" That wasn't what he meant to ask, not even close. But, it was what he wanted to know and he'd never lied to Nanny before.

Nanny was silent for a long time. The tears Warlock had been trying to hold back came, hot and wet and absolutely miserable. He hated crying, hated looking weak. His father said men shouldn't cry, his mother said it was silly to cry when he could act. Warlock was not thinking of them just then, however, he was thinking that Nanny had not yet responded. Maybe he really was mad, maybe he hated Warlock for turning eleven and getting him fired. Maybe-

"Never," Nanny said and there was something of a hiss about his voice, "Never. There is nothing you could have done to make me leave."

"But my dad said-"

"Your father is a bigot, an idiot, and a fool."

That brought a smile to Warlock's face even as the tears refused to stop. "Fool and idiot are the same thing, Nanny."

Nanny's arm around him tightened.

"So they are, and yet your father is a big enough nincompoop that he requires both of them."

Warlock giggled. No one except Nanny had ever said negative things about his father around him.

"Then why did you go?"

Nanny sighed.

"Ah, this is not an easy thing to say, Warlock," he said.

"It's okay, Nanny," Warlock hurried to say. He wanted to know why, no, more than that, he needed it. "I promise I won't tell anyone or anything."

Nanny waved one hand dismissively, "Oh, no one would believe you if you tried. No, it's hard because it makes me look like a bigger fool than your father and I dislike being compared to that man."

"But, you're nothing like him," Warlock protested, "Or mom. You, you're," he struggled to put into words what Nanny was. Finally he settled on, "You're you. And, you like me. They don't so you can't be like them." The grip on his shoulders tightened again.

"It's an odd tale," Nanny said, "It begins the night you were born. I was working for some pretty nasty people back then and I'd just been told to go to a small country hospital outside of Tadfield."

"The hospital I was born at?" Warlock asked. He felt Nanny nod.

"Yes," he said, "You and two other boys. Or, you and one other human boy. I was, erg, bringing the third."

"From where?" This wasn't like any of the bedtime stories Warlock was used to, but he sensed it was the most important one he'd ever hear.

"From his father, my boss," Nanny paused and took a deep breath before continuing, "The devil."

Suddenly, hundreds, thousands, of little oddities leapt out in Warlock's memories. Toys that moved by themselves, bullies who tripped over their suddenly untied shoelaces, parents who never got mad about the ruined vase in the front parlor, and so many more.

"You," he paused to swallow, "You're a devil?"

Nanny laughed, "No, not at all," he said. "I am a demon though. Not a particularly important one in the grand scheme of things, but I do alright."

"Why did you become my nanny?" Warlock's mind was whirling, his exhaustion forgotten.

"Like I said," Nanny said, "I was meant to bring my master's child, the antichrist, to the hospital and switch them with a normal human baby. Below, er, Hell that is, wanted the AntiChrist to be raised by powerful people so he would be well situated to end the world."

Suddenly it all coalesced into clear logic in Warlock's mind, every oddity about his childhood, the fact that his father was an important diplomat, the tales of destruction and strife that Nanny told him, the strange trip to the Middle East when the world seemed to be falling apart around them during the summer.

"I'm the AntiChrist," he whispered.

"Ah, no." Nanny actually let go of him and stood.

"What? But-"

He watched as Nanny scraped his hands through his hair and down his face. He started pacing.

"I fucked it up," he said, "I was meant to switch the babies but I didn't want to be there. I didn't want the apocalypse to start you see so I was in a hurry to get back to my er, my friend and get really very drunk. So, I let the nuns take care of the switch."

He paused in his pacing to look Warlock in the eyes.

"I want you to understand, Warlock, that this next bit does nothing to change how I feel about you."

"Okay," Warlock drug the word out, nervous for what would come next.

"You are not the AntiChrist," Nanny said firmly, "Your birth parents are from the village of Tadfield. The nuns screwed up, I screwed up, and the AntiChrist ended up with your birth parents and you ended up with the Dowlings."

A wave of relief swept through Warlock. Strangely, it was not directed at the news that he was not, in fact, the Devil's son, it was because-

"They're not my parents," he whispered.

"What?" Nanny asked.

"The Dowlings. They aren't my mom and dad, it doesn't matter that they don't love me because they aren't meant to."

"Oh, Warlock, no." Nanny collapsed into the chair across from his bed, his long legs sprawled out before him and his shoulders slumped. "You aren't mine either and I love you very much." It was the first time Nanny had ever said those words aloud to Warlock and his heart swelled in his chest. "They are supposed to love you biological, adopted, whatever, no matter what. Besides, they don't-" Nanny cut himself off with an inarticulate sound.

"What?" Warlock asked. They he realized what Nanny had been about to say, "Oh, they don't know I'm not theirs." Another thought occurred to him then. "And neither did you, know that I mean. You didn't know I wasn't the AntiChrist, which is why you-" He trailed off, the desire to cry was back. "You left after my birthday because you realized I wasn't him, didn't you?"

Nanny's face was ragged, twisted into something terrible and sad that Warlock hated to see, no matter how hurt he might be.

"Yes," Nanny said, "But, not because of what you're thinking."

"Then why?"

Nanny sighed, "We, Brother Francis is also involved in all this, though he prefers to go by Aziraphale- We were trying to stop the end of the world. We thought that if we both helped raise you I could influence you towards evil and he could influence you towards good."

"He's a demon too?"

That startled a laugh from Nanny. "Oh he's going to love that. No, he's an angel, white wings, halo and all."

Warlock was quite ready to believe in demons with one sitting in front of him, but angels seemed like a bit much. He decided to reserve judgement until later on that one.

"So you thought you could make me just like normal, not evil and not good?"

"Yes!" Nanny beamed at him, "You brilliant boy, the idea was that if you weren't one or the other then when the time came you wouldn't want to end it all."

"But I wasn't the right one?"

"No." Nanny stood from the chair and moved across the space between them to kneel in front of Warlock. He took his hands and held them tightly, "The only reason I left was because we needed to try and save the world and that meant doing things as Crowley, not Nanny Ashtoreth. And," he paused and looked away, "Well, Hell is not a nice place, Warlock. I worried that since I was about to defy them, if they knew I cared for you they might use you against me or Aziraphale."

"You left to protect me?"

Nanny smiled at him, "Yes, to protect you and to try and save the world and it worked. We saved the world and Adam, that's the actual AntiChrist, told Heaven and Hell to fuck off and I'm free. We're free. I can visit you again and not worry about my bosses checking in and putting you in danger."

"Really?"

"Really." Nanny studied his face, "Now, I know this is a lot and it's very late, so how about you get under the covers and I promise to tell you the whole story next visitor's day?"

"But I'm not in my nightclothes." Warlock protested without really thinking about it. His mind was whirling because 'next visitor's day' meant Nanny planned to return.

"Oh that's easy," Nanny said. His smile had shifted from kind back towards the one he wore while they were attaching coins to every surface that they could find. He lifted his left hand and snapped and suddenly Warlock was in nightclothes he'd never seen before, his hair was soft and clean and he was tucked under the covers.

"Just a little miracle before I go," Nanny smiled down at him. "Now, go to sleep." He stood and turned away, starting towards the door.

"Wait!" Warlock sat up, reaching towards him.

Nanny turned back, they eyebrow raised once more, "Yes?"

"Could you, I mean if you don't mind, could you maybe sing me a song before you go?"

The eyebrow vanished back behind the sunglasses. Nanny turned to fully face him.

"Of course, my little king." He said, "I will sing to you anytime you want me to, forever."

He reached out, pulling the covered back into place, and sat down in the chair once more.

Warlock drifted off to sleep with the sounds of his Nanny's singing voice, low and raspy and so familiar, wrapped around him.

He slept through the entire night and awoke fully rested for the first time since his parents dropped him off two months previously.

* * *

Nanny came back the next visitor's day, and then the next, and then the one after that. And on and on. Until finally, one day Warlock stopped being surprised. They whiled away the hours in easy conversation. Nanny told him stories about days long gone and, after Warlock asked one too many times, drug Brother Francis along with him. Warlock enjoyed watching them together, it was amazing to see Nanny truly happy, his entire being oriented towards the angel like a sunflower turning to the light. Warlock, who had liked Brother Francis alright, found he genuinely enjoyed Aziraphale who told the best stories about his adventures in the years he and Crowley were on opposite sides of things. The angel did not join Nanny for all his visits, but Warlock saw him once every few months.

In the summers, when Warlock was back in London with the Dowlings, Nanny appeared to drag him away for adventures around the city. Some days they walked along the streets all day and Nanny showed him how to 'annoy people for fun and profit', other days they spent hours in museums as Nanny told him about the real stories behind the artifacts. Warlock loved those days the best. He never tired of learned about the vast history held by a single clay tablet. Besides, it was fun to find out just how much the museums got wrong[4]

Suddenly, in less than the time it took to glue a coin to a staircase, eight years of monthly visits for tea and cakes and companionship passed with barely a note and Warlock found himself once more leaving home.

He knew without a shred of doubt that this time it was for good. He had no plans to ever live with the Dowlings again.

So, he found a little flat close to campus and used the money he'd been saving from years of petty scams with Nanny to pay for an entire year up front. And it was his. All his own. He adored it, tattered wallpaper and unreliable light switches and all.

One weekend when Nanny visited, he confided that he had no idea how to decorate the flat. The Dowling residence had always been in the height of traditional fashion and he did not want that. He wanted whatever the opposite of that was. Nanny grinned, a wild grin that spoke of offending one's elders, and they spent an entire afternoon in a local second hand shop picking the most hideous furniture they could find. Soon, his flat was decorated with clashing tartans in chartreuse and olive and a particular shade of orange that was only produced in 1973 and coordinated with exactly nothing. He had one wingback chair, a lumpy loveseat, and a footstool that could sleep three in a pinch. He loved all of them dearly and, when his parents made a rare visit, he was delighted to discover that they hated every single item in the flat. It was freeing and wonderful and he went out and bought a leopard print throw for his bed.

Then, the term began and Warlock's world changed again because the AntiChrist himself was in Warlock's Introduction to Political Science paper.

He blamed Nanny, he thought as he looked at the face of the boy his parents were meant to have raised. Of course the damn demon knew about this, he probably arranged it. Which was against Warlock's explicit request that neither angel nor demon interfere in things around him without telling him about it. There was nothing for it, he knew, he would just have to keep his head down and try to pass the paper without drawing attention to himself. Then, the professor decided that they should all introduce themselves and Warlock knew that the AntiChrist (whose name was Adam, what a goddamn cliché) knew who he was as well.

He scooped up his books and darted towards the door as soon as the lecture ended, hoping to make it out before-

"Hullo there," the AntiChrist said, "I'm Adam." Warlock turned to face him, attempting to keep his scowl in place, "I think he have some mutual friends?"

"Yeah," Warlock muttered, "We _had_ some mutual friends. I'm gonna kill that fucking demon."

The AntiC- _Adam_ laughed, it was the pleasant sort of laugh that Warlock had never quite managed.

"Would you like to get some lunch?" Adam asked.

Warlock rolled his eyes, "Fine," he muttered, "We might as well."

"Great!" Adam beamed at him. "I know this great little cafe just off High Street."

"Yay," Warlock muttered. However, he did not hesitate to follow the other teen.

Nanny was gonna get an earful the next time he saw him.

* * *

[1] Brother Francis' words, to remember that if they were mean it was because they were scared too and he should smile at them and love them just the same, seemed like good advice as well. But, he was eleven and loving everyone seemed like a pretty tall order.

[2] Nanny Ashtoreth had, to her chagrin, been obliged to affect a love of the written word to explain her vast knowledge of history.

[3] And quite a few that Warlock would only realize much later, should have been impossible to reach.

[4] Though, he was not convinced that Nanny was actually right all the time. There was just enough hesitation to some of the stories that Warlock thought he was maybe just trying to be impressive.


End file.
